Say what you will, Make laws to strangle life, shout from your pulpits, Your desks of editors, your woolsack benches Where judges sit, that this dull hypocrite, You call the State, has fashioned life aright-- The secret is abroad, from eye to eye The secret passes from poor eyes that wink In boredom, in fatigue, in furious strength Roped down or barred, that what the human heart Dreams of and hopes for till the aspiring flame Flaps in the guttered candle and goes out, Is love for body and for spirit, love To satisfy their hunger. Yet what is it, This earth, this life, what is it but a meadow Where spirits are left free a little while Within a little space, so long as strength, Flesh, blood increases to the day of use As roasts or stews wherewith this witless beast, Society may feed himself and keep His olden shape and power? Fools go crop The herbs they turn you to, and starve yourself For what you want, and count it righteousness, No less you covet love. Poor shadows sighing, Across the curtain racing! Mangled souls Pecking so feebly at the painted cherries, Inhaling from a bottle what was lived These summers gone! You know, and scarce deny That what we men desire are horses, dogs, Loves, women, insurrections, travel, change, Thrill in the wreck and rapture for the change, And re-adjusted order. As I turned From painting and from art, yet found myself Full of all lusts while bound to menial work Where my eyes daily rested on this woman A thought came to me like a little spark One sees far down the darkness of a cave, Which grows into a flame, a blinding light As one approaches it, so did this thought Both burn and blind me: For I loved this woman, I wanted her, why should I lose this woman? What was there to oppose possession? Will? Her will, you say? I am not sure, but then Which will is better, mine or hers? Which will Deserves achievement? Which has rights above The other? I desire her, her desire Is not toward me, which of these two desires Shall triumph? Why not mine for me and hers For her, at least the stronger must prevail, And wreck itself or bend all else before it. That millionaire who wooed her, tried in vain To overwhelm her will with gold, and I With passion, boldness would have overwhelmed it, And what's the difference?