Before I am completely shriven <br />I shall reject my inch of heaven. <br /> <br />Cancel my eyes, and, standing, sink <br />Into my deepest self; there drink <br /> <br />Memory down. The banner of <br />My blood, unfurled, will not be love, <br /> <br />Only the pity and the pride <br />Of it, pinned to my open side. <br /> <br />When I have utterly refined <br />The composition of my mind, <br /> <br />Shaped language of my marrow till <br />Its forms are instant to my will, <br /> <br />Suffered the leaf of my heart to fall <br />Under the wind, and, stripping all <br /> <br />The tender blanket from my bone, <br />Rise like a skeleton in the sun, <br /> <br />I shall have risen to disown <br />The good mortality I won. <br /> <br />Drectly risen with the stain <br />Of life upon my crested brain, <br /> <br />Which I shall shake against my ghost <br />To frighten him, when I am lost. <br /> <br />Gladly as any poison, yield <br />My halved conscience, brightly peeled; <br /> <br />Infect him, since we live but once, <br />With the unused evil in my bones. <br /> <br />I'll shed the tear of souls, the true <br />Sweat, Blake's intellectual dew, <br /> <br />Before I am resigned to slip <br />A dusty finger on my lip. <br /> <br /> <br />Submitted by Jen<br /><br />Stanley Kunitz<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/single-vision/
