Black Marble. 
By O'Shaughnessy, Arthur William Edgar. 


Sick of pale European beauties spoiled
By false religions, all the cant of priests
And mimic virtues, far away I toiled
In lawless lands, with savage men and beasts.
Across the bloom-hung forest, in the way
Widened by lions or where the winding snake
Had pierced, I counted not each night and day,
Till, gazing through a flower-encumbered brake,
I crouched down like a panther watching prey - 
Black Venus stood beside a sultry lake.

The naked negress raised on high her arms,
Round as palm-saplings; cup-shaped either breast,
Unchecked by needless shames or cold alarms,
Swelled, like a burning mountain, with the zest
Of inward life, and tipped itself with fire:
Fashioned to crush a lover or a foe,
Her proud limbs owned their strength, her waist its span,
Her fearless form its faultless curves. And lo! - 
The lion and the serpent and the man
Watched her the while with each his own desire.