Keep love and he sways apart
in another world,
outdistancing us.
Keep love and he mocks,
ah, bitter and sweet,
your sweetness is more cruel
than your hurt.
Honey and salt,
fire burst from the rocks
to meet fire
spilt from Hesperus.
Fire darted aloft and met fire:
in that moment
love entered us.
2
COULD Eros be kept?
he were prisoned long since
and sick with imprisonment;
could Eros be kept?
others would have broken
and crushed out his life.
Could Eros be kept?
we too sinning, by Kypris,
might have prisoned him outright.
Could Eros be kept?
nay, thank him and the bright goddess
that he left us.
3
AH, love is bitter and sweet,
but which is more sweet,
the sweetness
or the bitterness?
none has spoken it.