Vale, Amor!

We do not know this thing

By the spoken word:

It is as though in a dim wood

One heard a bird

Suddenly sing:

Then, in the twinkling of an eye

A shadow glooms the earth and sky,

And we stand silent, startled, in a changed mood.

It is but a little thing

The leaping sword,

When in the startled silence of changed mood

It comes as when a bird

Doth suddenly sing.

But thrust of sword or agony of soul

Are alike swift and terrible and strong,

And no foot stirs the dead leaves of that silent wood.