Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, HERE IS MUSIC: DOUBLE BALLADE WITH DOUBLE REFRAIN (2), by AUSTIN PHILIPS



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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

HERE IS MUSIC: DOUBLE BALLADE WITH DOUBLE REFRAIN (2), by                    
First Line: The crippled, phrygian, stoic freedman said
Last Line: Self-sold—and re-self-sold at second hand.
Subject(s): Prostitution; Harlots; Whores; Brothels


THE crippled, Phrygian, Stoic Freedman said
With cynic truth that different people sell
Themselves at different prices in their need,
(Each paves his own and personal path towards Hell!)
I have seen many mortals vendible
And marked their salesmanship, stood, sat and scanned
All kinds of souls at auction, watched as well
Some of them re-self-sold at second hand.

I have observed arrivistes, strongly swayed
By lust of place and pow'r, a miracle
Of shameless eagerness to escalade
(Each paves his own and personal path towards Hell!)
The Citadel, Success, make mean appeal
To prejudice, forge promise built on sand,
Repudiate agreement, burn cartel. ...
Self-sold—and re-self-sold at second hand.

I have known thieves whose plot and plan were played
Less for themselves than for the fancied weal
Of some loved lass—whose lawless ambuscade
(Each paves his own and personal path towards Hell!)
Their human fondness made less culpable. ...
Financiers, too, who had compass'd all they plann'd
For wife and offspring but for Fortune's wheel. ...
Self-sold—and re-self-sold at second hand.

I have sent men to prison—those who laid
Quick hands on letters, and so came to swell
The toll of wrongful doers, no-wise in crusade
(Each paves his own and personal path towards Hell!)
Against their fellows, but bewitched by spell
Of tout and Turf and—touched as though with wand
Of some enchanter loosing Life's fardel—
Self-sold—and re-self-sold at second hand.

I have seen women, pitiful, parade
Once beauteous bodies in some black bordel,
Harlot or pervert, brought and forced to wade
(Each paves his own and personal path towards Hell!)
Through filth, to feed some hateful 'mackerel'
Who battened on their bodies, bade them stand—
Himself spectator, pimp, stooge, manciple—
Self-sold and re-self-sold at second hand.

I have tracked many mansions in this trade,
Marts multitudinous, wherein there dwell
The all-but-good, the nearly-bad, brigade,
(Each paves his own and personal path towards Hell!)
The wholly weak, the almost strong, the fell,
The foul, the base, the pedant-soul'd, the band
Bestial, the sinning saint, the leal losel. ...
Self-sold—and re-self-sold at second hand.

Envoi

Such goes without surcease the cavalcade
Of Life; but all these souls thus mercable
One prostitute surpasses, sets in shade,
(Each paves his own and personal path towards Hell!)
This is that cur, ten times contemptible,
Who at a vengeful woman's vile command
Breaks with an old, true friend and trots at heel,
Self-sold—and re-self-sold at second hand.





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