Second philosopher’s song, Aldous Huxley

SECOND PHILOSOPHER’S SONG

IF, O my Lesbia, I should commit,

Not fornication, dear, but suicide,

My Thames-blown body (Pliny vouches it)

Would drift face upwards on the oily tide

With the other garbage, till it putrefied.

But you, if all your lovers’ frozen hearts

Conspired to send you, desperate, to drown—

Your maiden modesty would float face down,

And men would weep upon your hinder parts.

’Tis the Lord’s doing. Marvellous is the plan

By which this best of worlds is wisely planned.

One law He made for woman, one for man:

We bow the head and do not understand.

The end