Chastity, beloved chastity
O beloved chastity
how infinitely dear to me
chastity, beloved chastity!
That my body need not be
fingered by the mind,
or prostituted by the dree
contact of cerebral flesh —
O leave me clean from mental fingering
from the cold copulation of the will,
from all the white, self-conscious lechery
the modem mind calls love!
From all the mental poetry
of deliberate love-making,
from all the false felicity
of deliberately taking
the body of another unto mine,
O God deliver me!
leave me alone, let me be!
Chastity, dearer far to me
than any contact that can be
in this mind-mischievous age!