True Death

p. 174

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p. 175

TRUE DEATH

Aphrodite! inexorable Goddess, thou hast desired that happy youth with lovely curls should fade from me, too, in a few short days. Why did I not die altogether then?

I looked at myself in my mirror: I can no longer smile or even cry. Oh! lovely face that Mnasidika loved, I can't believe that you were really mine.

Can it be that all is ended now! I have not yet lived five times eight short years; I feel that I was born but yesterday, and now it must already be proclaimed: No one will ever love me any more.

I have shorn all my hair, and twined it in my girdle and I offer it to thee, eternal Kypris! I shall not cease from loving thee. This is the last verse of the pious Bilitis.