Page:A channel passage and other poems (IA channelpassageot00swinrich).pdf/144



of hell a word comes hissing, dark as doom, Fierce as fire, and foul as plague-polluted gloom; Out of hell wherein the sinless damned endure More than ever sin conceived of pains impure; More than ever ground men's living souls to dust; Worse than madness ever dreamed of murderous lust. Since the world's wail first went up from lands and seas Ears have heard not, tongues have told not things like these. Dante, led by love's and hate's accordant spell Down the deepest and the loathliest ways of hell, Where beyond the brook of blood the rain was fire, Where the scalps were masked with dung more deep than mire,