Faust and Margaret
“Devil,” he said, “Love’s Heaven—
Shall man not therefor lose his soul?”
“God,” she whispered, “is Love Heaven?
Is Heaven a place of dole?”
(And so she gave his Heaven to the man
Because the man did crave it.
And so because she never asked Hell’s ban
He gave it.)
“Devil!” he said, “Love’s Hell!
Man’s wild-beast-thirst, how slake it?
Take the tenderest thing, thus—thus!
Passion-torture it a spell,
And break it!”
“God,” she whispered, “Love is Heaven.
Love’s not what Love is made for us,
But what we make it.”
(And so her dead soul found what it had given,
And what he builded, there his damned soul ended....
And do you think that either Hell or Heaven
These sinners’ suffering-on-earth amended?)