Poems & poèmes/The Love of Judas

by Natalie Clifford Barney

 

THE LOVE OF JUDAS

Love, take me back to you, and make me whole,
Who am divided and in unbelief:
An infidel in thought and word and grief,
A double heart and a promiscuous soul!

And what if Judas offered Christ that bowl
Of greatest bitterness without relief.
Revenge, not silver, tempted such a thief:
Betrayed betrayer of the kiss he stole.

He loved the most; those others loved but well,
They drowsed: in dreadful paths his anguish trod,
Nor thrice denied the love that sold his God.

No pity for his throbbing jealous side.
No pity for his false obscure farewell;
Yet he alone for his lost master died!

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