Les Aventures De M. Colin-Tampon

A certain citizen of high renown For works of worth and justice in this town— A man of unrelenting rectitude, A pattern and a parable for the good— Died; and what ther he did and where he went Supplies the theme of this High Argument, His life had been a model for the throng. He had hated sin and sinners his life long, And most especially that entangling mesh That has to do with errors of the flesh, He had married, once, a cold and stupid dame Who viewed the loves of even the birds with shame; And of the horrors of their mutual bed, The better for mankind the less is said, He, finding intercourse thus a sorry evil, Believed it a concoction of the Devil; And with right honest will used tongue and pen To make sex loathsome to his fellow-men* , One night as he lay sleepless on his bed A sudden fearful pain shot through his head, And thought flashed black into a thunder-stroke. . . . Out of this darkness he at last awoke And heard a Voice speak, ominous and slow: "Awake, arise, and walk; for we must go." "Whither do ypu take me?" he with wondering eyes Asked the invisible Speaker, — "To the skies Where Heaven awaits me?" Coldly the Voice said: "Dismiss that foolish nonsense from your head. The Heavenly Courts of which your Prophets sung Are dwelt in by the beautiful and young, Who wander among Fields of Asphodel And lovely amorous secrets share and tell. But for the old-and-ugly-spirited Quite Other fate is all they merited In this world or the next. Soon you shall know. Awake, arise, and walk; for we must go." The Good Man bowed his head resignedly And followed to the street. There he could se^ The first cold grey of dawn across the sky, He heard the early milk-trucks bumping by; He saw the windows where his neighbors slept The sleep of just men, wise and law-adept.