Herein Divulged: Her Penchant For the Purloinment of Jewelry Items; Shocking Acts of Criminal Deviancy; and Profane Murder Most Macabre!
”Mes yeux deux beniners ardents
Le diable a mis ses doigts dedans”
”My eyes two burning holy-water fonts
The devil put his finger inside”
-Tristan Corbiere (1873)
(I)
She darts and weaves;
Flits between the gargoyles
Guarding crenellated towers
Of looming ziggurats.
Sepulchral stalagmites of barbed gothic spires
Shoot steepled fangs upwards
To pierce Heaven;
And impale the heart of God.
And Godless humankind
Wander numb with bovine tread
The gaslit streets below.
Asleep in hives of masonry,
Loitering in nebulous alleyways;
Or snug in curtained carriages
Traversing broad tree-lined boulevards
And the grand axis of avenues
Where monuments to empire align.
Equine hooves and wooden wheels
Clatter along the cobbles;
Stir the swirling mist which clings
To ornate bridges
That span the winding Seine
.
Our Lady, Fiend of Grace
Pauses - rests her haunches
On the moss laden ledge
Of a belfry cloaked in ivy.
Pupils enhanced with feline vision
Scour the undulating sprawl
Of urbane Paris-by-night .
A view stretching as far
As the dark haze of grey horizons
Will allow.
And La Seine slithers across the cityscape
Like a silver bloated leech
Sucking the blood from a crescent moon.
Freshly sated,
Irma Vep seeks not ruby fluids
Sheathed in shawls of skin.
But the brighter baubles,
Vain humans deem so dear.
Jewelry alight with inner fire;
More durable than flesh.
These she needs to bargain with
Entice eager tradesmen,
Who cherish gems and can supply
Many objects of desire.
Plush comforts for the crypt
Are her one conceit.
Transactions indubitably
Sealed with a kiss.
As thieving magpies filch
Tinsel bright to horde,
So covets she the shine
Of diamond, sapphire and amethyst.
The glow of priceless stone warms
The frigid vault of her dead heart,
Casting delicate lustre upon ivory hide.
Bracelets to adorn snow-white wrists
Where no pulse taps staccatto refrain.
Tiaras and diadems to contrast
Her jet-black coiffure; necklaces
To dangle from elegant alabastrine throat;
Tinkling cascades descending to
The cleft of her pert decolletage.
She was wont to stare for hours enraptured,
Peering into multi-faceted window apertures
Following shafts of scintillating hues
Along refracted beams of lightning
Seams cut through each prismic
Hall of Mirrors.
Chasing rainbows in the microcosm,
She seeks a stay from desperate pining;
A brief respite from hopeless yearning
For daylight`s eye; the solar orb.
A Sun no undead
Ghoul dares look upon.
-
(II)
The congregation felt the
Hooded gimlet gaze
Of His Most Holy Effluence,
Swoop down from lofty pulpit
To chastise the shallow flock
Shuffling in the pews.
Sniffing with disdain
He can scarce contain
His moral contempt;
The scorn His every fibre feels
For the common herd,
Skulls bent in obsequious oblation.
But with thoughts immersed
In treachery -
Their minds wed to sin.
Breathing deep, lungs expand
The profound obesity of a pendulous chest.
He commences to intone
In languid, sonorous, sober drone
His sermon for the eve.
The theologian inveighs with rumbling gut,
On the evils of this world;
Of harbingers of heresies;
Of demon-drink and absinthe-minded poets
Of unchaste dames in brothel-hells
Of opium dens where Satan surely dwells.
And crucifying anarchists
Is sound chastisement replete with only benefits.
For our Catholic enlightenment.
Mass concludes and e´er the moon
Could rise a notch upon the billowing firmament,
His Holiness departs La Sainte Chapelle
Through a back-door, to an awaiting hansom cab,
Avoiding physical proximities
With His doting diocese.
Within the sacrosanct haven
Of His ostentacious private chambers
Overlooking the Jardin de L Énfante,
He opines further on transgressions of the flesh,
Elaborating on ecclesiastical nuance
To the sole lamb attending.
Upon discarding robe and mitre,
The pontificating pederast eases
Bloated bulk betwixt
The bony shanks, convulsing buttocks,
Of a sobbing, suppliant choir-boy,
Who prays despairingly to the Virgin
For release
Or at least a swift demise.
Muttering mea culpas, Heaven`s
Mouthpiece prepares to stab -
Imagining the pain of iron nails
Hammered
Through the Saviour`s palms
On the hill of Golgotha,
So many years ago.
Here in this New Jerusalem,
This luminous City of Light ,
Temples to Man proliferate.
Their burnished gleam so bright
Even The Good Lord must avert
His Divine gaze or risk being struck
Blind by Faustian illumination.
Smug, the vested Sybarite knows
His trifling trespass will go unrecorded
In angelic annals holding our souls to account
Ere The Day of Judgement -
The Final Reckoning,
Cometh.
But
No mortal witness either must remain.
The boy
Forced poisoned wine down throttled gullet,
Will not live to tell the dawn
Of sordid acts the night concealed.
A recipe from the Borgias,
Adepts supreme of fatal draughts,
Slow-working yet impossible to purge,
Will silence the child`s tongue for all
Mortality.
A pity
Skin so silken; a voice so sweet.
The Bishop stroked the trembling lamb
Cooing soft platitudes
With a calming air.
Then
A swish of velvet drapes
Punctuated by a polite cough,
Wrenched The Holy Father
From His blissful reverie.
Angered at this insufferable
Imposition, He turned to vent His spleen
Incensed at the insolence this ingress incited.
An errant servant would suffer His wrath!
His Eminence strove to focus as
Amorphous shadow screened the form.
A shape shifting with the dark,
Drew closer. Noble bearing
evident despite the gloom
Refuting notions of lowly minion.
But lo!
A raging bellow flush with indignant ire
Switched to mortified gasp.
A woman!
She spoke with sibilant whisper
A sensuous address spilled
From exquisite mien.
A burgundy pout of coyly parted lips
Teasing with a glint of tongue
Ripe and moist, promising
A taste of pre-dawn dew.
Distilled in
Heady drops of finest cognac breath,
Lingering vapours
Seemed to annoint
Her words.
Her words.
An apology couched in sincerest terms
From a countenance so refined
Cannot aught but be graciously received.
Receipt of which grants clemency
For slights of uninvited guests.
The lateness of the Witching Hour,
The inexpedient avenue of ingress
So abrupt an arrival unannounced.
All these impositions
Did His Most Unctuous Excellency
Cordially deign to tender a solemn pardon.
All the while
Swatting at an incessent buzz
Of occluded insects;
Gnats too tiny for the dimlight
To discern.
Countess Vep explained her earnest need
Of absolution for her sins
This very night, for if unforthcoming
Then for certain would her stricken soul
Tread the fiery coals of Hell.
A confessional accord if
His Holiness saw fit to acquiesce
Would save this poor beleagured heart,
And He would be amply,
Ardently,
(her generous bosom seemed to Him
To swell with passionate resolve)
Assiduously
Rewarded.
Rewarded?
The idea of submitting this haughty Venus
To the caprice of unbridled concupiscence
Shook the rakish debauchee of devout cloth
To His vested core!
Naturally He would condescend to paste
A salve of Our Father`s forgiveness
Upon the sins however manifest,
This delectable Countess might confess.
Curse these flies!
Their humming threnody drives a man to distraction.
He struck again the intangible pests
With pudgy paw aflame with jewels.
Sparkling emeralds, rubies and other gems
Mounting coiled bands of shimmering gold,
Rings set in the flaccid flab
Of oily fingers thick as eels.
His blow was abruptly curtailed,
Halted in mid-swipe
Swatting empty air.
A manacle grip of iron clasped his wrist
In an unyielding vice.
Their eyes met reflecting
The gleam of dulcet mineral.
Both stood transfixed
One mesmerized by the sheen of surrogate suns;
The other by the twin black pits of livid
Irises intent on swallowing light.
The bishop blinked, the spell
Almost broken.
But the chitinous din grew louder
And His will was sapped anew.
Benediction?
Hazy lack of concentration took a while
To process the request.
And more by hierarchy`s ascendent instinct
Did He profer forth his splayed
Jewel encrusted hand,
As Countess Vep bent her neck
And knelt down upon a knee.
Prepared to receive His blessing.
Mumbling latin inanities,
His bloated fingers stroked her brow
And He let a wrist fall limp
To allow a kiss
Upon His holy ring.
Her lips were like ice, He had time to reflect,
Before He felt a fierce tug followed
Swiftly by a piercing sting between knuckle and extremity.
Bewilderment hindered comprehension
As a fountain sprayed its crimson spume
In a graceful arc
To the carpet at His feet.
Agony applied a reviving tonic to His addled wits
And the proud purveyor of dogmas did raise
Glazed piglet pupils
Towards the object of this fresh affront.
Her mouth was framed by a redness
Wet and she smiled
Revealing a glimmering array of vicious teeth, each
Tapered to a needle point tip.
Vep rose, slowly straightening her supple spine.
With bodkin nails of thumb and forefinger
She plucked from out her maw
One sodden twitching digit
Still adorned with ruby spangle.
The squeal His flapping throat emitted
Resounded like a rutting swine`s
And His Holiness grasped
The closest jewel-encrusted crucifix
To keep the Demoness at bay.
But she merely laughed
And took a step towards Him,
Flexing her talons in quick jerks of blurry motion.
It dawned then on the bishop
That since His God no longer watched
Over His errant flock
His talismens of consecrated power would not ward
Off evil any more.
He begged then.
Screamed for mercy as He fell before
Her flailing claws,
Knowing all too well the servants of His household
Were well aquainted with sounds so shrill
And would close their ears, pull their pillows
Over their heads to quell the tortured cries.
Tears welled up in His eyes as tensile whips
Cut corpulence to the quick.
The Faith He had deserted
Abandoned Him now to butchery;
Sacrificed His infidelity
With a gruesome
Dispatch.
-
(III)
Irma Vep bedazzled, stood gazing at her haul.
With a covetous glow rougeing high cheekbones
And the practiced eye of an avid collector,
She admired the iridescent lustre of each precious stone.
She clamped her teeth down hard on brittle fingers
Tearing loose each glittering prize one by one.
Immersed.
Oblivious to the rustle of linen.
A sudden whimper pricked her elfin ears
And her nostrils sought its source.
Soon to be discovered
Trembling beneath the soiled bedsheets of an ornate
Carved four-poster bed
She found the abused, dying boy.
Dessert…?
-
(IV)
The child rarely ventured
Out before the advent of dusk;
These days grown painfully bright .
He preferred to pray
Fervently, with hands clasped
Tightly together, upon his knees.
He would kneel for hours
Before an image
Of the Blessed Virgin
Willing his still heart
To convey his adoration and gratitude.
The holy fathers were impressed
By his devotion
And his voice!
Angelic ecstacy sweet as honey.
Never had beauty blended
With sublime melancholy
To fill the air beneath the ribbed vaults
Of La Sainte Chapelle
With such exquisite euphony.
Surely the boy was touched by God.
Yet he knew despite his seraphic demeanour
They avoided him.
The child could sense their uncertainty,
Smell fear clog the pores of perspiring
Skin and hear their hushed tones
As they spoke of him.
He could also hear their beating hearts,
The rush of blood flowing
Through pulsating veins;
The lubricating trickle seeping
Through internal organs.
Strange and horrifying visions
Would afflict his mind`s eye
More and more – unceasingly
These chill Winter days.
Whenever he felt madness threaten
To overcome his chaste resolve
He would pray once again
To the Immaculate Madonna
Who saved him
On that dark terrible night
Long ago.
The boy would stare up at the sparkling
Stained-glass windows,
Refracting shafts of coloured light
Like jewels…
And eventually
A sense of peace
Would soothe his lost tormented soul.
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