Chapter XI

With the same love that you were for me long ago
a garden of splendour whose wavering coppices
shaded the long grass and the docile roses,
you are for me in these black days a calm and
steadfast sanctuary.

All is centred there: your fervour and your
brightness and your movements assembling the
flowers of your goodness; but all is drawn
together closely in a deep peace against the
sharp winds piercing the winter of the world.

My happiness keeps warm there within your folded
arms; your pretty, artless words, in their
gladness and familiarity, sing still with as
great a charm to my ears as in the days of the
white lilac or of the red currants.

Oh! I feel your gay and shining cheerfulness
triumphing day by day over the sorrow of the
years, and you yourself smile at the silver
threads that slip their waving network into your
glossy hair.

When your head bends to my deep-felt kiss, what
does it matter to me that your brow is furrowed,
and that your hands are becoming ridged with hard
veins when I hold them between my two steadfast
hands!

You never complain, and you believe firmly that
nothing true dies when love receives its meed,
and that the living fire on which our soul feeds
consumes even grief to increase its flame.