Dorian Gray and Eternal Youth

Dorian Gray sat in the drawing room
watching the wrath of the oceans
the marquis of Queensberry
was feasting on roast beef
denouncing Beauty
as an evil to the youth

Socrates questioned this fact :
if Beauty is blasphemy
then what of life should we be proud of?
Deceit, hypocrisy, worship of stars, cowardice?

So Dorian Gray stood up for once
and walked down the cul-de-sac
from Dublin to London to Paris
in search of his elixir :
to be or not to be
forever young
in a field of hay
which burns as the fire of 1666
as Gothic cathedrals become black
with a fiery rebuke from Nature

Nero fiddles as Rome burns
laughing hysterically
as pious men with a purpose
try to moderate Beauty
with a divine purpose
only to be burnt at the stake

As Socrates refuses to budge
and admit Beauty is a curse
Dorian Gray returns to Athens
to seek the solace
of the oracle of Delphi
only to learn that she too is dead
withered in a flimsy cotton gown
because the emperor in Rome
couldn't fathom her prophecies
and assumed she was mad
for speaking the truth
and warning him against
gluttony and corruption
and enslaving virile men
in chains and whipping them
into submission to a treachery
they rebelled against
on account of their love for beauty ...