And bearing through all my days the fever
And thirst of a poisoned love. Were I stronger,
Or weaker, perhaps my scorn had saved me,
Given me strength to crush my sorrow
With hate for her and the world that praised her --
To have left her, then and there -- to have conquered
That old false life with a new and a wiser, --
Such things are easy in words. You listen,
And frown, I suppose, that I never mention
That beautiful word, FORGIVE! -- I forgave her
First of all; and I praised kind Heaven
That I was a brave, clean man to do it;
And then I tried to forget. Forgiveness!
What does it mean when the one forgiven
Shivers and weeps and clings and kisses
The credulous fool that holds her, and tells him
A thousand things of a good man's mercy,
And then slips off with a laugh and plunges
Back to the sin she has quit for a season,
To tell him that hell and the world are better
For her than a prophet's heaven? Believe me,
The love that dies ere its flames are wasted
In search of an alien soul is better,
Better by far than the lonely passion
That burns back into the heart that feeds it.
For I loved her still, and the more she mocked me, --
Fooled with her endless pleading promise
Of future faith, -- the more I believed her
The penitent thing she seemed; and the stronger
Her choking arms and her small hot kisses