Then the sickness came and lasted
three weeks. The virus consumed my limbs
and wasted the resolves of my faith;
I felt hunger and pain such as mountains
blown up upon the earth contain.

My eyes, once sympathetic with sight,
grew savage. I couldn't hide the fever,
I was all appetite.

Desire bloomed in the anarchy of sense.
Unleashed, it subverted all thought
and deified a blind, uncaring beast;

the beast of self which longs
to harvest forbidden fields
and taste the fruit which kills.

Was this when I learned your name?
Was this when I dreamed you?
Desire's iron mask too tight for my face,
I squeezed myself into its cold frame
and begged to be seized again.