Variations on a friend's poem No. 2

This place is locked inside of land
and no stagnant lake will do.
The maddened women living there
mix rue with honeydew.

Since I cannot have the sea
a cathedral will suffice;
a place where they don’t slam their doors
even if your soul is ice.

There are smells you can’t define
moving with a dusty draft
and you catch the hint of breadcrumbs
and a little vicious ash

and I’m scowling at the faces
that are stained into the wall;
they tell us ancient stories
of the men after the fall

who eradicated traces
of that atavistic glee
that turns righteous men to evil
and burns life up like knotted weeds.

I wonder if the water
will be deep enough for me.
They have told me that it’s holy
but it’s enough that it is free.

Oh, Polonius, don’t tell me
of your daughter murdered there.
The Styx writhes at its boundaries
and it wets your virgin’s hair.