/lit/ - Literature

I worshipped, when my veins were fresh,
A glorious fabric of this flesh,
Where all her skill in living lines
And colour (that its form enshrines)
Nature had lavished: in that guess
She had gathered up all loveliness.
All beauty of flesh, and blood, and bone
I saw there; ay, by impulse known,
All the miracle, the power,
Of being had come there to flower.
Each part was perfect in the whole;
The body was one with the soul;
And heedful not, nor having art,
To see them in a several part,
I fell before the flesh, and knew
All spirit in terms of that flesh too.

But blood must wither like the rose:
’Tis wasting as the minute goes;
And flesh, whose shows were wonders high,
Looks piteous when it puts them by.
The shape I had so oft embraced
Was sealed up, and in earth was placed—
And yet not so; for, hovering free,
Some wraith of it remained with me:
Some subtle influence that brings
A new breath to all beautous things,
Some sense that in my marrow stirs
To make things mute its ministers.
I fall before the spirit so,
And flesh in terms of spirit know—
The Holy Ghost, the truth that stands
When turned to dust are lips and hands.

'Revelation' from William Baylebridge's collection 'Life's Testament':

I worshipped, when my veins were fresh,
A glorious fabric of this flesh,
Where all her skill in living lines
And colour (that its form enshrines)
Nature had lavished: in that guess
She had gathered up all loveliness.
All beauty of flesh, and blood, and bone
I saw there; ay, by impulse known,
All the miracle, the power,
Of being had come there to flower.
Each part was perfect in the whole;
The body was one with the soul;
And heedful not, nor having art,
To see them in a several part,
I fell before the flesh, and knew
All spirit in terms of that flesh too.

But blood must wither like the rose:
’Tis wasting as the minute goes;
And flesh, whose shows were wonders high,
Looks piteous when it puts them by.
The shape I had so oft embraced
Was sealed up, and in earth was placed—
And yet not so; for, hovering free,
Some wraith of it remained with me:
Some subtle influence that brings
A new breath to all beautous things,
Some sense that in my marrow stirs
To make things mute its ministers.
I fall before the spirit so,
And flesh in terms of spirit know—
The Holy Ghost, the truth that stands
When turned to dust are lips and hands.

>20
>This VItal Flesh
>it's a great work that will be remembered centuries to come

>>15171139
buy and sell shares and use your profits to self-publish like a boss

Life, like some strong and radiant god,
In spirit half-glimpsed,
Trod before me in that splendid shadow,
And, with the voice of a lover, called,
So that I blindly followed, heeding no lord else,
And strained to convert that half-sight into full vision,
And clasp, if I might, my Belov’d.

My soul fought on to nearer space;
But, alas! it got no nearer:
Subtle pits had the world to foil the foot, veils to hood the eye;
So that I despaired.

Among men, then, I lifted up my voice for him;
But few, how few! had hailed him;
And those mostly had trod earth in old seasons,
When lusty lovers were his, with great hearts,
And hands sufficient for their ministry.
No, nevermore, I cried, will that radiant one pass in full sight among men.

Then, War, I went out and saw thee,
With thy prosperous sickle
Mowing in spacious fields of breathing flesh.
O, there Death quickened my foot,
There lifted the scales from my eyes,
So that I came up with and looked upon Life—
So strong, so beautiful,
I knew him for God!

>cries

>My Soul,
>Leaping on strong wings
>The fence of this flesh,
>Beat her way to the Ultimate Soul—
>Was merged
>In that all-perfecting amplitude.

>There,
>For an eternal moment,
>She escaped utterly—
>Clasping to her all intuition,
>Of all things,
>Knowing not these from herself,
>Nor herself from these.

>Why, my Soul, didst thou forsake
>That apotheosis?
>Why didst thou remember, and straight recede—
>O bathos beyond reckoning!—
>Into the circumscription
>Of this shell?

>Thy resigned apprehension,
>Returning to its old servitude,
>Its servitude to this flesh,
>Again isolated thee;
>On weakened wings didst thou descend
>Into the old cage,
>The cage sacred to necessity.

>What horrible stridency is this, flung with such force
>Into the silence?
>Is it some ruined god, bellowing his despair?
>Some challenge cast at the good folk
>Who people this select suburb?

>The wrath of countless ages is in it,
>The primal urge that has goaded flesh from the beginning.
>So loud it is, so insistent,
>It dispels the thought we would fain give
>To the petty matters that await our hands.

>All our smug complacency is stunned by it.
>We pursue our affairs as shadows,
>Coerced into an acquiescence that it forces upon us.

>Is it a curse upon rejection of something vital,
>A flinging into our ears of a truth
>That we regulate our existences to forget?

>Hear it!
>Is it the shouting of some tremendous and dark spirit that we thought we had conquered centuries ago?
>Is it some Satanic laughter that would shame
>The enervation that has tamed this blood in us?
>Is it a guffaw conceived in Hell
>To shatter the fundamentals of our petty Heaven?
>What ancient and terrible derision does it hurl at us?
>Is it thunder of this age?

>No; in keeping with a suburb so quiet and select as this is,
>It is a neighbour’s cow,
>Pastured by him in a paddock worth a fortune as building sites,
>And crying for a bull.

>2019
>he hasn't read the Australian Nietszche
>he hasn't immanentized the vital spirit of Australia in flesh

>he hasn't read the Australian Blake

actually, it's William Baylebridge

>he hasn't read the Australian Nietzsche

This world is driven by two contending powers--
Love, that coerceth Heaven to dwell with dust,
And that dire pledge of Hell's self-perjured Lust--
And as we list must Heaven and Hell be ours.
Not light the election runs: lo, each devours
That savour set in each, while equal gust
Each uses; yet our choice support we must--
Blest wine or, this rejected, sweat that sours.
Love, oft through Hell that seems, acclaims what Heaven!
But Lust, through seeming Heaven, with easy breath
Slides on to Hell, how soon, how richly given!
If Love to heavenly state so quickeneth,
While Lust must e'er in cheating Hell be shriven,
They sponsor what, these powers, but Life and Death?