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The Harlot and The Nun
by Clement Yore

Two figures lay in the morgue
  Dragged from the river deep:
A harlot was one the other a nun,
  Wrapped in endless sleep,
With a cake of ice at their shoulders,
  And nobody there to weep.

The features were much distorted,
  Only the clothes could name,
Which was the nun and the other one
  The woman lost to shame;
But the clothes were taken away
  When the coroner s deputy came.

And somehow their garments were mixed,
  And thus when identified,
The fallen one became the nun,
  And she was sanctified;
And the holy sister was buried alone
  As though her shame to hide.

The woman of shame lies honored,
  In Calvary's holy ground,
While Sister Celeste always will rest
  Till the very last trumpets sound,
As nineteen hundred and eight,
  In a city's nameless mound.

So only the Master knows them
  From the records of the mind;
"Judge not," He said, "the quick nor dead
  Lest ye be judged in kind;"
For woman's woes are many,
  And the human eyes are blind.