Still yesterday he met my gaze,

But now his eyes are darting shiftly!

Till birdsong at first light he stayed,—

Now larks are crows, met with hostility!

So I am stupid, you are wise,

You live, I lie dumbstricken, numb to you.

O how the woman in me cries:

“O my dear love, what have I done to you?”

The ships of lovers-lost set sail,

A white road takes the lover shunning you …

Across the world a long-drawn wail:

“O my dear love, what have I done to you?”

There only yesterday he kneeled.

He called me his “Cathay” admiringly.

Then spread his palm out — to reveal

A rusty kopek, a life derisory.

Like an infanticide in court

I stand detested, shy, confronting you.

Yet still I ask, when I am brought

To Hell: “O my dear love, what have I done to you?”

I asked the chair, I asked the bed:

“Why should I bear the pain, the misery?”

“He wants to torture you” they said,

“To kiss another. Where’s the mistery?”

He taught me living—at furnace heat,

In icy steppe he left me suddenly.

“That is what you, dear, did to me!

O my dear love, what have I done to you?”

Now all is plain—don’t contradict!

I see again—I’m not your partner.

A heart that love leaves derelict

Is fair terrain for Death-the-Gardener.

Why shake the tree? Ripe apples fall

To earth themself and never trouble you …

Forgive me now, forgive me all

That I, dear love, have ever done to you!