T. R. Smith, comp. Poetica Erotica: Rare and Curious Amatory Verse. 1921–22.
Usury
By Orrick Johns (1887–1946)(From “Hedone”; from Black Branches, 1920) |
TREASURE I aught beneath the stars | |
| to scorn thy soul’s ihlang-ihlang … | |
| Have I some yet crescendent bars | |
| no other suitor learned or sang? | |
| These searching fingers unashamed, | 5 |
| sweet with the ink that blots the sun, | |
| are they not tigers loosed and tamed | |
| to fright thee, child of Babylon? | |
| My tangled hairs and anguished jaws | |
| above the loom like riddled flags, | 10 |
| storming beyond the menopause | |
| to whitened Hylotheic crags. | |
| Thou shalt fall back, the knotted loins | |
| of thought are pressing on unbound! | |
| the pillars and the deep-lunged groins | 15 |
| of reticence are flung to ground. | |
| Yet for thy love’s ihlang-ihlang | |
| these fiery flanks obey, are still | |
| and the uncivilized mustang | |
| of beauty sleeps … it is thy will. | 20 |