XVIII

Io! Io! There runs a juice of pleasure's rage

Through these frames' mesh,

That now do really ache to strip and wage

Upon each others' flesh

The war that fills the womb and puts milk in

The teats a man did win,

The battle fought with rage to join and fit

And not to hurt or hit!

Io! Io! Be drunken like the day and hour!

Shout, laugh and overpower

With clamour your own thoughts, lest they a breath

Utter of age or death!

Now is all absolute youth, and the small pains

That thrill the filléd veins

Themselves are edged in a great tickling joy

That halts ever ere it cloy.

Put out of mind all things save flesh and giving

The male milk that makes living!

Rake out great peals of joy like grass from ground

In your o'ergrown soul found!

Make your great rut dispersedly rejoice

With laugh or voice,

As if all earth, hot sky and tremulous air

A mighty cymbal were!