The Dove

p. 172

THE DOVE

I have long been lovely; the day is coming when I shall no longer be a woman. Then I'll know rending memories, burning solitary envies, and my tears will bathe my hands.

If life is a long dream, what use is there in resisting it? Now, four and five times every night I ask for amorous joy, and when my flanks are tired I fall asleep where'er my body lies.

At morning I raise my lids and I shiver in my hair. A dove is at my window; I ask it what month it may chance to be. It says: "This is the month in which women are in love."

Ah, whatever month it be, the dove speaks truly, Kypris! And I throw my arms about my lover's neck, and trembling stretch my still torpid legs to the very foot of the tumbled bed.