"'Tired of the homeless deep,
Look how their flight yon hurrying billows urge,
Hitherward but to reap
Passive repulse from the iron-bound verge!
Insensate, can they never know
'Tis mad to wreck the impulsion so?'"
In this excerpt, the narrator is telling the virgin about the absurdity of her commitment to purity. He possesses so much sexual prowess that he thinks she is a fool for not taking advantage of him. He's exhausting himself trying to impress her, but she remains stoic and impassable. Arguing that desire holds merit, the man says it is useless and crazy to try and resist the natural impulses.
"'An art of memory is, they tell:
But to forget! forget the glad
Wherein Fate sprung Love's ambuscade,
To flout pale years of cloistral life
And flush me in this sensuous strife."
The man continues to plead with the virgin. He says that he can make her forget her religious commitment. After all, desire sneaks up on you; it's a trap. It is not, however, one to be avoided. Because sex is so powerful and sweet, even the fact that it was originally undesirable will quickly fade in its ecstasy. If she will allow him to demonstrate his skills in bed, then she will regret any previous religious commitment to purity.
"'Now first I fell, what all may ween,
That soon or late, if faded e'en,
One's sex asserts itself. Desire,
The dear desire through love to sway,
Is like the Geysers that aspire --
Through cold obstruction win their fervid way.
But baffled here -- to take disdain,
To feel rule's instinct, yet not reign;
To dote, to come to this drear shame --
Hence the winged blaze that sweeps my soul
Like prairie-fires that spurn control,
Where withering weeds incense the flame."
In this quotation, the narrator is struggling with his sexual passion. Even if he doesn't want to feel this way, eventually he knows that his desire will consume him. It's just waiting to erupt like cold rushing water straight upward. Though he knows that he should resist temptation, he no longer feels in control of himself. He has become the slave of his desire. He's ashamed. Eventually this burning desire will consume him and leave him defeated in the ashes of failed discipline.
"Why hast thou made us but in halves--
Co-relatives? This makes us slaves.
If these co-relatives never meet
Self-hood itself seems incomplete.
And such the dicing of blind fate
Few matching halves here meet and mate."
The man asserts his belief in soulmates, asking God why He would institute such a cruel system of halves. If a person's other half resides in another person, then what happens if the two never meet? Neither will ever reach his or her full potential as they will be missing their better half. This is the cruel trick of fate, which grants some mercy and others suffering.
"For never passion peace shall bring,
Nor Art inanimate for long
Inspire. Nothing may help or heal
While Amor incensed remembers wrong.
Vindictive, not himself he'll spare;
For scope to give his vengeance play
Himself he'll blaspheme and betray."
The narrator believes that desire is a corrupter. It denies its bearer peace. As if no other thing in existence can satisfy, love blinds the lover to all other things. The lover doesn't want to bear this burden either, so he punishes himself when he is rejected. Unable to move on, the narrator concludes that he is hopeless in the hands of desire. He will destroy himself slowly, pining after this virgin denied him.
