Dark Remembrance

Take her in your arms.

On this bed of fragrant asphodel, then lay her gently down.

No Elysium for her,

 

And no rosemary either, sweet Ophelia! 

Dark remembrance gathers in gloom on the hearts of a thousand lovers and

Forty thousand brothers.

 

Bathe her glassy limbs in the streams of Lethe;

Wrapped in the velvet darkness, oh so soft her face!

Place the freezing nightshade at her breast, Life.

 

Be a drop of sweet mandragora

On the pale coral of her lips, Love. Or, rip through her sluggish veins,

Be the shrapnel and splinters in her blood.

 

Kiss her lightly, Death; press her eyelids down

With your icy fingertips. Close, then, your teeth around her gently.

Let Ophelia sleep!