Still yesterday he met my gaze,
But now his eyes are darting shiftly!
Till birdsong at first light he stayed,-
Now larks are crows, met with hostility!
So I am stupid, you are wise,
You live, I lie dumbstricken, numb to you.
O how the woman in me cries:
“O my dear love, what have I done to you?”
The ships of lovers-lost set sail,
A white road takes the lover shunning you…
Across the world a long-drawn wail:
“O my dear love, what have I done to you?”
There only yesterday he kneeled.
He called me his “Cathay” admiringly.
Then spread his palm out – to reveal
A rusty kopek, a life derisory.
Like an infanticide in court
I stand detested, shy, confronting you.
Yet still I ask, when I am brought
To Hell:”O my dear love, what have I done to you?”
I asked the chair, I asked the bed:
“Why should I bear the pain, the misery?”
“He wants to torture you” they said,
“To kiss another. Where’s the mistery?”
He taught me living – at furnace heat,
In icy steppe he left me suddenly.
“That is what you, dear, did to me!
O my dear love, what have I done to you?”
Now all is plain – don’t contradict!
I see again – I’m not your partner.
A heart that love leaves derelict
Is fair terrain for Death-the-Gardener.
Why shake the tree? Ripe apples fall
To earth themself and never trouble you…
Forgive me now, forgive me all
That I, dear love, have ever done to you!
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