Helena: When waiting shall but goad
The speed of peril?
Antonio: Still: and strain to win
Him from this brink.—If vainly, then birth, pity,
And memory shall fall from me!—all, all,
But fierceness for thy peace!
Helena: My Antony!
Antonio: And fierceness without falter!
Helena: I am thine,
Thine more than immortality is God's!
Hear, does the nightingale not tell it thee?
The stars do they not tremble it, the moon
Murmur it argently into thine eyes?
Antonio: Ah, sorceress! You need but breathe to put
Abysm from us; but build words to float us
On infinite ecstasy. (Kisses her.)
Helena: How, how thy kisses
Sing in me!
Antonio: From my heart they do but send
Echoes born of thy beauty mid its strings!
Helena: Then would I lean forever at thy lips,
Lose no reverberance, no ring, no waft,
Hear nothing everlastingly but them!
(A mournful chant is borne from the Convent. They slowly unclasp, awed.)