Boys lounge and look on, and elucubrate
What the round brush is used for, what the square,—
So was explained—to me the skill-less man—
The manner of the grooming for next world
Undergone by Felice What’s-his-name.
There’s no such lovely month in Rome as May— (250)
May’s crescent is no half- moon of red plank,
And came now tilting o’er the wave i’ the west,
One greenish-golden sea, right ’twixt those bars
Of the engine—I began acquaintance with,
Understood, hated, hurried from before,
To have it out of sight and cleanse my soul!
Here it is all again, conserved for use:
Twelve hours hence I may know more, not hate worse.
Was not a Pope then Pope as much as now? (260)
Used not he chirrup o’er the Merry Tales,
Chuckle,—his nephew so exact the wag
To play a jealous cullion such a trick
As wins the wife i’ the pleasant story! Well?
Why do things change? Wherefore is Rome un- Romed?
I tell you, ere Felice’s corpse was cold,
The Duke, that night, threw wide his palace-doors,
Received the compliments o’ the quality,
For justice done him,—bowed and smirked his best,
And in return passed round a pretty thing, (270)
A portrait of Felice’s sister’s self,
Florid old rogue Albano’s masterpiece,
As—better than virginity in rags—
Bouncing Europa on the back o’ the bull:
They laughed and took their road the safelier home.
Ah, but times change, there’s quite another Pope,
I do the Duke’s deed, take Felice’s place,
And, being no Felice, lout and clout,
Stomach but ill the phrase “I lose my head!”
How euphemistic! Lose what? Lose your ring, (280)
Your snuff-box, tablets, kerchief!—but, your head?
I learnt the process at an early age;
’Twas useful knowledge in those same old days,
To know the way a head is set on neck.
My fencing-master urged “Would you excel?
“Rest not content with mere bold give-and-guard,
“Nor pink the antagonist somehow-anyhow,—
“See me dissect a little, and know your game!
“Only anatomy makes a thrust the thing.”
Oh Cardinal, those lithe live necks of ours! (290)
Here go the vertebræ, here’s Atlas, here
Axis, and here the symphyses stop short,
So wisely and well,—as, o’er a corpse, we cant,—
And here’s the silver cord which…what’s our word?
Depends from the gold bowl, which loosed (not “lost”)
Lets us from heaven to hell,—one chop, we’re loose!
“And not much pain i’ the process,” quoth the sage:
Who told him? Not Felice’s ghost, I think!
Such “losing” is scarce Mother Nature’s mode.
She fain would have cord ease itself away, (300)
Worn to a thread by threescore years and ten,
Snap while we slumber: that seems bearable:
I’m told one clot of blood extravasate
Ends one as certainly as Roland’s sword,—
One drop of lymph suffused proves Oliver’s mace,—
Intruding, either of the pleasant pair,
On the arachnoid tunic of my brain.
That’s Nature’s way of loosing cord!—but Art,
How of Art’s process with the engine here?
When bowl and cord alike are crushed across, (310)
Bored between, bruised through? Why, if Fagon’s self,
The French Court’s pride, that famed practitioner,
Would pass his cold pale lightning of a knife
Pistoja-ware, adroit ’twixt joint and joint,
With just a “See how facile, gentlefolks!”—
The thing were not so bad to bear! Brute force
Cuts as he comes, breaks in, breaks on, breaks out
O’ the hard and soft of you: is that the same?
A lithe snake thrids the hedge, makes throb no leaf:
A heavy ox sets chest to brier and branch, (320)
Bursts somehow through, and leaves one hideous hole
Behind him!
Oh, if men were but good! They are not good,
Nowise like Peter: people called him rough,
But if, as I left Rome, I spoke the Saint,
—“Petrus, quo vadis?”—doubtless, I should hear,
“To free the prisoner and forgive his fault!
“I plucked the absolute dead from God’s own bar,
“And raised up Dorcas,—why not rescus thee?” (330)
What would cost such nullifying word?
If Innocent succeeds to Peter’s place,
Let him think Peter’s thought, speak Peter’s speech!
I say, he is bound to it: friends, how say you?
Concede I be all one bloodguiltiness
And mystery of murder in the flesh,
Why should that fact keep the Pope’s mouth shut fast?
He execrates my crime,—good!—sees hell yawn
One inch from the red plank’s end which I press,—
Nothing is better! What’s the consequence? (340)
How does a Pope proceed that knows his cue?
Why, leaves me linger out my minute here,
Since close on death come judgment and the doom,
Nor cribs at dawn its pittance from a sheep
Destined ere dewfall to be butcher’s-meat!
Think, Sirs, if I had done you any harm,
And you require the natural revenge,
Suppose, and so intend to poison me,
—Just as you take and slip into my draught
The paperful of powder that clears scores, (350)
You notice on my brow a certain blue:
How you both overset the wine at once!
How you both smile! “Our enemy has the plague!
“Twelve hours hence he’ll be scraping his bones bare
“Of that intolerable flesh, and die,
“Frenzied with pain: no need for poison here!
“Step aside and enjoy the spectacle!”
Tender for souls are you, Pope Innocent!
Christ’s maxim is—one soul outweighs the world:
Respite me, save a soul, then, curse the world! (360)
“No,” venerable sire, I hear you smirk,
“No: for Christ’s gospel changes names,
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