Lawrence Durrell
Feria: Nimes
Feria; cloaked trigonometry of hooves
The plane trees know, shiver with apprehension;
They plead as the archons of the blue steel must
These prayers, refining murder by a breath,
Turn self-deception to an absolution —
Two coloured pawns uniting in the rites of death.

Brocade still stiff with bloody hair he kneels
While the mithraic sun sinks in a surf
Of bloody bubbles; leads from the huge pizzle
The holy urine smoking in the dust.
He reels into a darkness which he dazzles.

Tall doors fall as the axes must,
And the great sideboard of the bull is there,
A landslide in the ordinary heart
A feast for gods within a coat of hair,
His thunder like a belfry and his roars
The minotaur of man's perfected lust,
His birth-pangs offered to the steel's applause.

(from "Caesars Vast Ghost: Aspects of Provence", 1990)