[Cannibal]

Originally Posted by FloridaChief

"I understand absinthe makes the tart grow fonder. It is extremely detrimental to the complexion ... I never presented a more debauched appearance than I do this morning."

--Ernest Dowson, 1897

Dowson also wrote this poem:

Green changed to white, emerald to
opal: nothing was changed.

The man let the water trickle gently
into his glass, and as the green clouded,
a mist fell from his mind.

Then he drank opaline.

Memories and terrors beset him. The
past tore after him like a panther and
through the blackness of the present he
saw the luminous tiger eyes of the things
to be.

But he drank opaline.

And that obscure night of the soul,
and the valley of humiliation, through
which he stumbled, were forgotten. He
saw blue vistas of undiscovered countries,
high prospects and a quiet, caressing
sea. The past shed its perfume over
him to-day held his hand as if it were a
little child, and to-morrow shone like a
white star: nothing was changed.

He drank opaline.

The man had known the obscure
night of the soul, and lay even now in
the valley of humiliation; and the tiger
menace of the things to be was red in
the skies. But for a little while he had
forgotten.

Green changed to white, emerald to
opal: nothing was changed.

I like it! I am going to google the author's name.