Page:Myrtle and Myrrh.djvu/21



Into this world they tell me I was sent

Wrapt in a bornoose, which was rudely rent

And flung away, by her who first didst touch

My steaming flesh; I never loved her much,

The surly, stolid, sordid, spectral hag:

For never would my star of fortune lag—

No dwarf of earth to oppose my will would dare—

If my sebaceous bornoose she did spare,

And if around my neck, the ajouz says,

It hung, locked in a charm, for twenty days.

But ever since the amulet was torn,

The curse of gods and jinn and men I've worn;

And to my flesh it stuck—a Nessus shirt—

Despite the oozing blood, and not spurt

Of power, alas! is left me to control

The stinging tongue of an avenging soul.