So they talked, Forgave each other. And that very day Two priests were talking of confessionals A mile or so from the Tower, where Lilli Alm And Ludwig Haibt were having tea. You say The coroner was ignorant of this! What is the part it plays with Elenor Murray? Or with the inquest? Wait a little yet And see if Merival has told to him What thing of value touching Elenor Murray Is lodged in Father Whimsett's heart or words. FATHER WHIMSETT Looking like Raphael's Perugino, eyes So slightly, subtly aquiline, as brown As a buck-eye, amorous, flamed, but lightly dimmed Through thought of self while sitting for the artist; A nose well bridged with bone for will, the nostrils Distended as if sniffing diaphanous fire; A very bow for lips, the under lip Rich, kissable like a woman's; heavy cheeks Propped with a rounded tower of flesh for neck: Thus Perugino looked, says Raphael, And thus looked Father Whimsett at his desk, With vertical creases, where the nose and brow Together come, between the eye-brows slanting Unequally, half clown-wise, half Mephisto, With just a touch of that abandoned humor, And laughter at the world, the race of men, Mephisto had for mischief, which the priest Has for a sense which looks upon the dream And smiles, yet pities those who move in it. And Father Whimsett smokes and reads and smiles. He soon will hold confessional. For days he has heard nothing but complaints of lovers, And searched for nullities, impediments, Through which to give sore stricken hearts relief: There was the youth too drunk to know he married A woman never baptized. Now the youth Has found another--oh this is the one! And comes and says: Oh, holy father, help me, May I be free to marry her I love, And get the church's blessing when a court Dissolves the civil contract? Holy Father, I knew not what I did, cannot remember Where I was married, when, my mind's a blank-- It was the drink, you know. And so it goes, The will is eyeless through concupiscence, And that absolves the soul that's penitent. And Father Whimsett reads his Latin books, Searches for subtleties for faithful souls, Whereby the faithful souls may have their wish, Yet keep the gospel, too.