The Saint: The Imagistic Self

The saint could count a hundred doors;

Escape was seldom; what remained

Beyond the torrent of the stars

Was naked laughter to the mind:

Then bitter heat of demon's lair.

But vainly would he scamper near

The door as yet uncatalogued:

There, in surgery's unrepair,

Were fancy autocratic rogues

Concealing plight in dusty fog.

And then the saint in voiceless vow

Foreknew his imagistic self:

And all the pander, all the low

Forbidden fancies, twisted, halved,

Were scattered where no words allow.

Yet wonder at prodigious fame,

Bewildered in acaustic feat,

He bridged the Quest's allotted Time,

Foreswore the doors uncounted, met

Their gaze. And in this sudden room

Where vixens played, and words were clouds,

The saint could falter in his choice;

Then count a hundred doors, and brood

Escape as unpermitted vice

That breaks in showers round his hood.