O let us both have pity on ourselves!
My love, remember, great as is this world,
Two of us only on this mighty earth,
Upon the seas of sand two drops of dew.
Scarce breathes a little wind, from the earthly vale
For aye we vanish—ah! together perish!
I came not here for this, to torture thee.
I would not on me take the holy vows,
Because I dared not pledge my heart to Heaven,
While yet in it an earthly lover reigned.
I in the cloister would remain, and humbly
Devote my days to service of the nuns.
But there without thee, everything around
Was all so new, so wild, so strange to me!
Remembering then that after many years,
Thou shouldst return again to Mary’s town
To seek for vengeance on the enemy,
The cause defending of a hapless folk,
I said unto myself, “Who waits long years
Shortens with thoughts; maybe he now returns,
Maybe is come. Is it not free to ask,
Though living I immure me in the grave,
That once more I may look upon thy face,
That I at least may perish near to thee?
And therefore to the hermit’s narrow house
Upon the road, upon the broken rock,
I will betake me, and enclose myself.
Some knight maybe, in passing by my hut,
May speak aloud by chance my loved one’s name;
Among the foreign helmets I may view
His crest; though changed the fashion of his arms,
Although a strange device adorn his shield,
Although his face be changed, even then my heart
Will recognise my lover from afar.
And when a heavy duty him compels
To shed the blood of all and to destroy,
And all shall curse him, one heart yet alone
Shall dare afar to bless him.” Here I chose
My habitation and my grave apart,
In silence, where the sacrilege of groans
The traveller dare not listen. Thou, I know,
Lovest to walk alone. Within myself
I thought, “Maybe at even he will come,
Having his comrades left behind, to hold
Converse with winds and billows of the lake;
And he will think of me and hear my voice.”
And Heaven did fulfil my innocent wish.
Thou earnest; thou didst understand my song.
I prayed in former times that dreams might bless
Me with thine image, though the form were mute:
To-day, what happiness! To-day, together,—
Together we may weep!