So very near in dreams the naked body, nice
Even when armed, and like a shield, and white;
Dark the pudenda in the midst like a device,
The badge of bliss and blazon of delight.
There Eros practises
his
plays in paradise
And member-loving Aphrodite might
Be to her Adonis for a second what she seems
In the hall of night and hospital of dreams.
For ought I not to know the signs of the disease
By now: what I don't have and what you are?
And see the diagnosis confirmed as it agrees
With every previous wound and precious scar.
Fever at first is thrilling, it never fails to please,
Only slowly do the symptoms become peculiar.
Illness is idiosyncratic: healthier to ignore
The fact in favour of the metaphor.
Whatever science does the experiment succumbs,
Its tools are deadly, dexterous and deep,
Each local anaesthetic altogether numbs;
I sigh for love's suppository sleep.
Out of dismemberment the unconscious comes
Awake to take its medicine and weep.
The dear physician does the necessary, sings
A measure, pleasure's overture: it stings .
Antaeus when once separated from the ground
Relaxed within the grasp of Heracles;
Above the earth he sought his mastery, and found
That he could conquer only on his knees.
As
we by the laws of gravity, too, bound
Savour the aftertaste of victories
In which like children caught up and tossed in sport
We for a moment flew without support:
Until the firm familiar arms of fantasy
Turn transparent as the window pane
