In honor of John Wilmot,
2nd Earl of Rochester


The pleasure of debauchery now wanes
As nature's faulty wisdom did intend
And disillusion from confusion reigns;
Such cruelty no man can comprehend.

Infused design to lose the joys of bliss
While hurling toward the milldew of the grave
Is interupption by sadistic kiss
Of pleasure acquisition all men crave.

This plan condemned by healthy men impaled
Upon the rotting slow decay of age;
Their sacred instruments of pleasure failed,
Replaced by constancy of bitter rage.

Addiction to the pleasures found in youth
Is gifted by creation bound at birth,
Not consequential to rejecting truth
For truth is pleasure captured here on earth.

Do gods indulge the bliss of pleasured states?
Or are the gods forbidden to partake,
In pleasures of the flesh, by unkind fates?
While man can take all pleasure he can make.

I say to fate let gods enjoin the chase
Of pleasures bound in lewd carnality.
This might inspire a paradigmn of grace
Upon their victims of infirmity.

Man early on learns pleasure's promise well,
Though eyes that see don't see fragility
Awaiting many as a living hell
Who in long life find harsh reality.

For those of us who love debauchery,
Shared lovingly with others of our kind,
Our loss of bliss becomes pathology
Imposed by vengeful gods of simple mind.

But I, as champion of carnal light,
Forgive assasins ignorant of bliss
Found willing in another's flesh all night;
They've had no bliss like I will always miss.

And if no gods of nature have been part
Of man's progressive loss of hardened form,
Then he might look to pleasures of the heart;
Outside debauchery's addictive storm.

Though fate may take erotic joys away,
My memories still conjur visions clear
When innovation was the rule of play
And nothing was forbidden out of fear.

"Party on Garth"...

Les