On slippery London pavement
In fog, sub-lunar, white –
Many a creature will pass by,
You’ll remember her, terrified.
Her brow in thorns? or filth?
One cannot with certainty tell;
Are these hints of miracles
On her lips . . . or? spume from hell! . . .
You’d say, that book is the Bible
Rolling thus in slime –
No one ever reaches for it,
For it is not – virtue’s time! . . .
Despair and money – two words –
Flash in her web-shrouded eyes.
Whence comes she? . . . only she knows.
Where goes she? . . . where nothing is!
Such is Mankind – a witchlike crud
That weeps today and finds things funny;
– Its history? . . . knows only: “blood! . . .”
Its institutions? . . . – only: “money! . . .”
London, 1854