The Conversion of the Reverend Skinner
'Dare you reach so high, girl, from the gutter of the street?' She slapped his cheek and turned his tongue right over: 'Your church has cursed me till I am black as it: The devil has my preference forever.' She spoke. An upstart gentleman Flashed his golden palm to her and she ran. But he lay there stretched full length in the gutter. He swore to live on dog-licks for ten years. 'My pride has been the rotten heart of the matter.' His eyes dwelt with the quick ankles of whores. To mortify pride he hailed each one: 'This is the ditch to pitch abortions in.' He stared up at the dark and he cursed that; 'As if my own heart were not bad enough, But heaven itself must blacken with the rot!' Then he saw the thin moon staggering through the rough Wiping her wound. And he rose wild And sought and blest only what was defiled.
The Conversion of the Reverend Skinner - meaning Summary
Blessing the Condemned
The poem follows a clergyman whose contempt for a woman exposes the cruelty and pride behind his religious authority. After she rejects him, Skinner attempts extreme self-punishment, yet his shame becomes another form of obsession and judgment. His final vision changes his direction: he abandons purity as a standard and turns toward blessing what society and religion have treated as stained or excluded.
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