YOU felons on trial in courts, You convicts in prison-cells, you sentenced assassins chain'd and handcuff'd with iron, Who am I too that I am not on trial or in prison? Me ruthless and devilish as any, that my wrists are not chain'd with iron, or my ankles with iron? You prostitutes flaunting over the trottoirs or obscene in your rooms, Who am I that I should call you more obscene than myself? O culpable! I acknowledge''"I exposfi! (O admirers, praise not me''"compliment not me''"you make me wince, I see what you do not''"I know what you do not.) Inside these breast-bones I lie smutch'd and choked, Beneath this face that appears so impassive hell's tides continually run, Lusts and wickedness are acceptable to me, I walk with delinquents with passionate love, I feel I am of them''"I belong to those convicts and prostitutes myself, And henceforth I will not deny them''"for how can I deny myself? | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE OLD VICARAGE, GRANTCHESTER by RUPERT BROOKE ODE WRITTEN IN [THE BEGINNING OF THE YEAR] 1746 by WILLIAM COLLINS (1721-1759) THE BRIDGE: 7. THE TUNNEL by HAROLD HART CRANE THE MAIZE by WILLIAM WHITEMAN FOSDICK WREATHE THE BOWL by THOMAS MOORE ANOTHER SPRING by CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI DEEDS OF VALOR AT SANTIAGO by CLINTON SCOLLARD |