And we, consumed by constant misery,
At length must part—and parting is to die!
How moving is it, when the minstrel sings,
To 'scape the death that separation brings!
Oh, grant, some god, to one who suffers so,
To tell, half-guilty, his sad tale of woe!
II. ELEGY
When man had ceased to utter his lament,
A god then let me tell my tale of sorrow.
What hope of once more meeting is there now
In the still-closed blossoms of this day?
Both heaven and hell thrown open seest thou;
What wavering thoughts within the bosom play!—
No longer doubt! Descending from the sky,
She lifts thee in her arms to realms on high.
And thus thou into Paradise wert brought,
As worthy of a pure and endless life;
Nothing was left, no wish, no hope, no thought,
Here was the boundary of thine inmost strife:
And seeing one so fair, so glorified,
The fount of yearning tears was straightway dried.
No motion stirred the day's revolving wheel,
In their own front the minutes seemed to go;
The evening kiss, a true and binding seal,
Ne'er changing till the morrow's sunlight glow.
The hours resembled sisters as they went,
Yet each one from another different.
The last hour's kiss, so sadly sweet, effaced
A beauteous network of entwining love.
Now on the threshold pause the feet, now haste,
As though a flaming cherub bade them move;
