I'll strike you without rage or hate
    The way a butcher strikes his block,
    The way that Moses smote the rock!
    So that your eyes may irrigate

    My dry Sahara, I'll allow
    The tears to flow of your distress.
    Desire, that hope embellishes,
    Will swim along the overflow

    As ships set out for voyaging,
    And like a drum that beats the charge
    In my infatuated heart
    The echoes of your sobs will ring!

    But am I not a false accord
    Within the holy symphony,
    Thanks to voracious Irony
    Who gnaws on me and shakes me hard?

    She's in my voice, in all I do!
    Her poison flows in all my veins!
    I am the looking-glass of pain
    Where she regards herself, the shrew!

    I am the wound, and rapier!
    I am the cheek, I am the slap!
    I am the limbs, I am the rack,
    The prisoner, the torturer!

    I am my own blood's epicure
    - One of those great abandoned men
    Who are eternally condemned
    To laugh, but who can smile no more!