PERVANEH (Rising slowly to her feet and laying her hands on the shoulders of her lover): Oh, let us die! Not for my dishonour, Rafi. What is my dishonour to me or to you, beloved, or the shame of a girl's virginity to him who made the sea? This clay of mine is fair enough, I think, but God hath cast it in the common mould. O lover, lover, I would walk beneath the walls and sell my body to the gipsy and the Jew ere you should cry "I am hungry" or "I am cold."
RAFI
Die for love of me—for a day and a night of love!
PERVANEH I die for love of you, Rafi! Behold, the Spirit grows bright around you: you are one with the Eternal Lover, the Friend of the World. His spirit flashes in thine eyes and hovers round thy lips: thy body is all fire!
RAFI
Comfort me, comfort me! I do not understand thy dreams.
PERVANEH (Her arms stiffening in ecstasy) The splendour pours from the window— the spirits in red and gold. Death with thee, O lover, death for thee, death to attain thee, O lover—and then the garden—then the fountain— then the walking side by side.
RAFI
O my sweet life, O my sweet life—must this mad dreaming end thee?
PERVANEH Sweet life—we die for thy sweetness, O Lord of the Garden of Peace. Come, love, and die for the fire that beats within us, for the air that blows around us, for the mountains of our country and the wind among their pines you and I accept torture and confront our end. We are in the service of the World. The voice of the rolling deep is shouting: "Suffer that my waves may moan." The company of the stars sing out: "Be brave that we may shine." The spirits of children not yet born whisper as they crowd around us: "Endure that we may conquer."
RAFI
Pervaneh, Pervaneh!
PERVANEH
Hark! Hark!—down through the spheres—the Trumpeter of Immortality!
"Die, lest I be shamed, lovers. Die, lest I be shamed!"
RAFI Die then, Pervaneh, for thy great reasons. Me no ecstasy can help through the hours of pain. I die for love alone.