Your patience, Sirs. The Devil took me up
To that black and burned mountain over Sicily
(Fit place for me) and thence I saw my Earth--
(Not all Earth's splendour, 'twas beyond my need--)
And that one spot I love -- all Earth to me,
And her I love, my Heaven. What said I?
My love was safe from all the powers of Hell--
For you -- e'en you -- acquit her of my guilt--
But Sula, nestling by our sail-specked sea,
My city, child of mine, my heart, my home--
Mine and my pride -- that evil might visit there!
It was for Sula and her naked port,
Prey to the galleys of the Algerine,
Our city Sula, that I drove my price --
For love of Sula and for love of her.
The twain were woven -- gold on sackcloth -- intertwined
Past any sundering 'till God shall judge
The evil and the good.
-- Rudyard Kipling, 1892