Black, black, the sheen of his back and shoulders
Blazing, his brawn and wide forehead plunging
On, on into wrath, hooves detonating the dust
Under his rushing darkness, the green and white
Streamers fixed in the hump of his anger rattling
And snapping behind like slaver from a mad mouth, and
The high-shaken lances of his tossing horns seeking
Bodies for shock, his wrath like a ghost seeking
Bodies to sink in, to house in, destruction to be wrought,
Out of the starving dark, daring headlong
The one-way doors of day, he hurls himself now
Into the orange light, and lunging down
Like judgment erupting or a dark planet he crashes
Across the spread glare and becomes the raging centre
Of these flickering faces ranged in rings, who thirst
For his darkness, who stare like blains
In the sun-blaze. They thought it was they
Who for their thirst’s sake, and that their black fear might be
Loosed and defeated in the familiar light, conceived
A darkness and set him there. But all black
Is the abyss brooding, and he brings into the day
The one dark, that was there before the world was. Low
In his own shadow deep as a mountain he waited
Till they said, “Now we are all together
And seem brave in the light, let the challenging shadow
Show itself among us; now, that we may shame it,
Let there be dark.” And he heard the first day
Of Creation banging on the barrier, and, ravenous,
His red eyes saw the light. And, look: he became
The black sun and burst among them, and the sun has horns
As the moon has, whereby all dawns shall be bloody
And all wests ripped with crimson! Bull. And legs,
Spoke-flashing of knees, even thunder of hooves seem as
nothing
To pillar and propel that bulk and fury. His belly gulping
For breath sucks up and drops like a blast-shaken
Floor; between his flanks censer and tassel
Of generation swing and lurch, and nothing in the profound
world
Blares deep as now his maddened bellow. What torment is it
That baits him, that wrings forth this roar: for the men
Performing with bright darts are toys merely,
Masquers playing with emblems, signifying far off
The one faceless pain, momentary puppets
Of the infliction he tolls. The blood and burning
In his eyes are not blindness, but bring the world’s rage
To be seen red as it is. And oh do not suppose
Because a thin blade may empty him suddenly
Of fury, and his black become the colour of quiet,
That it means that the known earth is broad world enough
To be his battling-ground. His death, though dedicated,
May end much, but will fulfill nothing; will be adequate
Neither to sate the size and lust of his fury
Nor to gather and bless with acceptable sacrifice
Those faces so small, so faint and far that still
They sit and sway in a world where such things
As danger are. But he, for all fear’s reasons
Worshipful, slumps back into fear’s secret
And abyss, more terrible, for his rage disdains now
All that they know of pain, and looks like infinite
Gentleness, waiting, forever patient,
Black, with long horns. What trouble is it
That baits them now, since the shape they made of their fear
Is dead? The light is different. And they are alone.
Toro
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