In Xanadu did Kubla Khan.
With walls and towers were girdled round.
And here were gardens bright with sensuous rills, Where blossomed
And here were forests ancient as the hills, Enfolding sunny spots
As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted.
By woman wailing for her demon lover.
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail.
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher’s flail:
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Then reached the caverns measureless to man, And sank in tumult
… to a lifeless ocean.
And midst this tumult Kubla heard from afar.
Ancestral voices prophesying war.
It was that miracle of rare device, A sunny pleasure dome with
A damsel with a dulcimer, In a vision once I saw.
Could I revive within me, Her symphony and song.
To such a deep delight ‘twould win me, That with music
I would build that dome in air.
That sunny dome, those caves of ice.
And all who heard should see them there, And all should cry,
All that he has done of moment, he had done twenty years ago:
Pleasure-dome decreed.
Pillars of Kubla.
Vermillion.
Canonical Strangeness.
Kubla Khan performers, 1950. Owner Eddie Pond is seated at right
thefingerfuckingfemalefury: patiencelovecourage: thefingerfuckingfemalefury:
orientallyyours: Barbara Yung long career as a burlesque performer