VERONIKA
So young,
It is all like some dream before the sunrise,
That left me but that little shipwrecked Star.
PIPER
Why did you marry Kurt the Councillor?
VERONIKA [humbly] He wanted me. Once I was beautiful.
PIPER [wonderingly] What, more than now?
VERONIKA
Mock if you will.
PIPER
I mock you;
O Woman, . . . you are very beautiful.
VERONIKA
I meant, with my poor self, to buy him house
And warmth, and softness for his little feet.
Oh, then I knew not,—when we sell our hearts,
We buy us nothing.
PIPER
Now you know.
VERONIKA
I know.
His dearest home it was, to keep my heart
Alone and beautiful, and clear and still;
And to keep all the gladness in my heart,
That bubbled from nowhere!—for him to drink;—
And to be houseless of all other things,
Even as the Lonely Man.
[The PIPER starts]
Where is the child?
PIPER
No; that I will not tell. Only thus much:
I love thy child. Trust me,—I love them, all.
They are the brightest miracle I know.
Wherever I go, I search the eyes of men
To find such clearness;—and it is not there.
Lies, greed and cruelty, and dreadful dark!
And all that makes Him sad these thousand years,
And keeps His forehead bleeding.—Ah, you know!