  With shameless and incessant lust Thy tremulous hot hands are thrust Upon my body’s loveliness. O loathsome Age, thy foul caress Puts on my heart a deadly blight, Withers my hair to leprous white, Binds fetters on my eager feet That once on Springtime’s road were fleet To bear me to Love’s shining goal. Now bitter tides of sorrow roll To drown me in a sea of woe And God looks on, and wills it so! Give over thy pursuing, Age! Fearest thou not my lover’s rage? For he is young and strong of limb, Thou canst not stand a bout with him. Ah, surely he will laugh to see So wan a suitor wooing me. Then with wild scorn his heart will swell And he will fling thee back to hell. O Love, that stronger art than Death, Enfold me from the burning breath Of Age that has grown amorous, That sears and blasts me. Even thus, Men say, his passionate embrace Spoils maids and flowers of their grace, And every woman’s fate is cast To be his paramour at last. And so all lovely things are made Shameful, and in the ashes laid, To die alone, uncared for. Such Is the pollution of his touch. Stars that have shone since Time began, Rivers that saw the birth of man, And mountains that are fair and green, And were, when Helen was a queen, White dreams that never can grow old, Stories of love and glory told By Homer once, and ballads sung Eons ago—ye still are young. Tell me the secret of your youth. Can any weeping fill with ruth Age, that is harsh and pitiless? Nay, they are blind to my distress. They have not feared the grasping hand Of Age, and cannot understand. Love saw my whitened hair and laughed And bid me drain my bitter draught. While in my lover’s startled eyes A lurking terror strangely lies. There is no place in which to hide When Age comes seeking for his bride. |
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