XLV

When I look back upon my early days,
In what a wilderness of love I spent
My flower of life, and how I seized and bent
Each proffered heart to suit my fickle ways;
How many tender buds were crushed, to raise
The piteous incense of their virgin scent
To the cruel nostrils and the cold intent
Of that bad idol, Self, set up for praise:
I can but shudder at the waste of sin
In which my wicked hours were sometime passed
And wonder that such bonds could hold me fast,
Who now abhor the paths I wandered in
With wanton Circe and her bestial kin;
I, safely, sheltered in thy heart at last.