The Waking World, Fytte V

An Epic Fairytale in (mostly) Sonnet Form. Chapter 6- Underland

Underland

I leapt to flee from that defil’d couch,
Repentant of my sacrilegious tryst;
She follow’d me, my blood around her mouth
And taunting laughter on her sanguine lips.
“Come hither, boy,” she mock’d me in delight,
And cloak’d herself again in woman's flesh,
“Come hither boy, and risk a second bite,”
Then once again assum’d the serpent dress.
Beside the bed there stood a second door
Which I had spy’d when I first found that place.
I did now what I should have done before,
And dodging past the wyrm, made my escape.
Thus was I free’d from out the serpent's nest,
Yet bore her shame and mem’ry in my flesh.

Once more I found myself in darkness wrapt
And welcom’d her dark folds to hide my shame—
Asham’d that I had been so simply trapt.
Erro I had been call’d, and earn’d the name.
From bondage into bondage all my road;
From error into error was my way;
The way of wisdom was to me unknown,
And false was ev’ry path I chose to take.
And yet, I could not think but with some pride
Of my escape from the enchantress’ arms.
For I had left her chamber still alive,
And taken pleasure from her offer’d charms.
Her venom thus began to take effect,
But I was heedless of my bitten neck.

A tum’rous heart and poison in my veins—
So Death and Sin co-mingl’d in my blood,
Incest’ous pair that did once guard Hell's gate
And built the bridge from thence to Eden's sod,¹
In tándem cavortéd in human clay
And wrought corrupted fruit within my soul.
So on I travel'd in my downward way,
And deathly ill, I thought that I was whole.
The venom fog’d my brain and vision blur’d;
The tumor, feeding on it, dully ach’d.
The pain and shame my body stoop’d and curl’d.
Bent and crooked I walk’d with shambling gait.
In this way I began to look around
And found myself in caves deep underground.

It seem’d to me a grim and dour place;
Dim, and yet not impenetrably so;
Replete with shifting, wisp’ring shadow wraiths
That seem’d to utter auguries of woe.
They clamour’d ‘round about on bat-like wings
All soft and silent, murm’ring all the while.
Full many sly and wingéd creeping things
To further seed my heart with lies and guile.
One fiend above the rest did creep behind
And whisper blasphemies into my ears–²
Despair and promises both in their kind;
They fed and fed on my conceit and fears.
And yet, throughout this subterran’an land
My candle lay forgotten in my hand.

1. See Paradise Lost by John Milton: Book II, Lines 648-814; and Book X, Lines 230-305

2. See Christian’s passage through The Valley of the Shadow of Death in The Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan.