Joseph Warren Beach

From “Dry Points”

IN a chamber choked with shadows

The dim light overhead

Reveals a ghostly figure

Bent down above my bed;

A figure dim and priestly,

Soft-footed and discreet,

With sacramental beard and eyes

Above his winding sheet.

His eyes are close and narrow

And shaded from the light,

But something strange and eerie

Yet glitters to my sight.

His voice is soft and toneless,

With a hint of faraway

Uncanny resonances heard

Beyond our night and day.

His fingers strong and skilful,

That follow every curve,

Wake quivers of sensation

In each remotest nerve.

And ever, as he passes

His palms along my skin,

He goes on speaking grave and still

Of Satan and of sin.

And out of the prophet Daniel

And out of John the seer,

He proves the Second Coming

And how it draweth near.

He strips the scarlet woman

And lays the dragon bare,

And shows me Armageddon red

About us everywhere.

…..

His voice grows faint and fainter.

His face I cannot see.

A flush of warmth and drowsiness

Flows up and covers me.

My waking soul goes under

In gradual eclipse …

I sleep, and dream of judgment day,

And dread Apocalypse.