Mea Culpa, Mea Maxima Culpa

Trimalchio lifted himself to the altar, the Parian podium
Plaqued with the flowering grace: "Forgive my sin,
Venus," he said, but knew no other homage he could add:
For what description of the beauties, laced with rhyme,
Might please the goddess' wrath, or woven in sublime
Textures and fissures of apostrophe? I am a pale, lean
Thing, he thought, but only thought, and then he turned in his dismay
From darkening marble. Night descended on the sun's old throne,
Cooled the flames of sin, proformed her beaming rod
In giant holes of scope and pocks in school. Her convex face
Diminished in the distance of his gaze. By his feet a bent
And poppied haze curled into buds; his own face blushed.
The buzz of beas gathers in the thyme, the honey sweetness of a myrtle
Sways in clement breezes, and his tracks wander far
From the arching torch-light, as his mangy shadow pleases.