Amid the pathos of the decay of character
I have found the highroad leading to an income,
And a bland, flaunting, shameless income,
As delicious as a harlot's.
After all, I have not made love in vain,
And the women shall pray--and keep me!
It will give me also the strengthening wine
Of revenge for the stupidities
And inanities and ruined beauty
Of the disappointing daughters of Eve.
I have found all women stupid save Maenad Mauna.
But she had too many characters,
And she got lost in them,
And so I hate her most of all.
Shadowy women, why were you all so stupid?
You were all pretty--and Mauna was exquisite
To the point of ecstasy--
But you broke my heart,
For you could not save me from tiring of you.
And so you must pay the penalty,
And it shall be by providing me with an income.
I have searched for years for an income,
And now I have found it,
It is very simple.
I have every letter ever written to me--
Don't you remember how I read all the other women's letters?
And I have read all the others
All your letters.
You learned everything about one another,
And each of you thought she alone
Had the secrets.
And the letters--did you not write indiscreetly,
And damningly, and surrenderingly?
And I have all the letters.
I shall offer them to you all for sale--
Each woman may buy back her own letters,
All but Mauna.
Will you buy?
I think so.
If you do not, I shall publish them--
Each collection in a separate volume,
And then you will be lost.
I begin tomorrow having them typewritten,
And the day after my income begins.
I may spend the winter pleasurably in Nice--
I can try my new system at Monte Carlo.
I hold your reputations in my hands,
And you must pay,
Else I shall open my hands, and you will be ruined.
It is useless to balk, to beseech,
You must capitulate.
For those of you who are recalcitrant
I shall have many prods of terror--
And revivifying cruelty will make the days
Glad and exciting for me.
Dear women, you have done well--
Most of you have husbands,
And some of you have children.
You all have speckless names.
Why ever in the world were you so rash
As to write to me as you did.
If you try to avoid my levy
I shall send you a copy
Of one of your letters on a day
When you are giving a brave dinner,
With a little printed slip reminding you
Of the volume soon to go to the printer.
Will it not chill your blood?
Will you not pay?
But for you, Maenad Mauna,
I shall have no mercy.
There was no excuse for you--
You were lovely, you were of a brain
Satisfying and many-coloured and winding,
And you ran through the days
Like a perfumed breeze.
You could have charmed me for the whole of life--
I can forgive the others, but not you.
I can forgive the two who married me--
They, at least, divorced me--
But you, like me, let your character go bankrupt,
you were too many women,
And so I lost you.
Your letters shall be published,
And you will lose everything you now hold dear,
For you have become a striking woman,
And scorn will sear you.
Why were you at all--if you were not to remain?
What have you now that shows
With what we might have had together?
There is a reason for every one else,
But none for you.
They were born stupid, and their beauty left them,
But you had magnificent understanding and hunger for joy,
And your beauty only increased
As you ministered to your senses.
The others shall give me an income,
But you will afford me atonement.
When I publish the book of your letters
You will be thrust from your home;
You will become a prostitute.
I know you will die in the gutter--
Perhaps, when I see you there
I shall cease to love you,
For you were the moon that might have saved the stars.
