Framed in ebon memories her picture hangs there upon the walls of my brain. ’Tis not the face I put there in my youth: that glorious youth of me, slain by its lusts, bitten to death by the baby vampires that swarmed in its blood. The lost woman of my soul! warm lips, black eyes—face that was a prism of love shot through by the rays from some dumb despair— Long has it vanished. And the dust of my acts have gathered on that brow, And my sins have smitten her cheeks to a pallor, and her eyes welter in two brackish tears— Tears that have lain stagnant in those bony cups for a myriad soul-cycles I have wrought my own decay into that face: it has traveled the way of my own dissolution. Will it break on my brain-walls and streak all my rottenness anew? And a spider has woven a web over and around the great frame of ebon and the thin bladder of flesh that once was her face— A leering, grinning spider has woven his web there, A leering, grinning spider whose mouth sucks poison Lead on, hell-lights
Publication History
The Shadow-Eater [1915/17 and 1923]
1923 Edition Text Changes
- ebon memories her picture > ebon memories, her picture
- me, slain > me, ⁋ Slain
- the baby vampires > the vampires
- black eyes—face > black eyes— ⁋ Face
- that brow, and my sins > that brow, ⁋ And my sins
- [New stanza at “I have wrought…”]
- frame of ebon and the thin > frame of ebon ⁋ And the thin
- [Final line is its own stanza]