LOVERS COME to you, my Queen, and proudly lay their riches at your feet: but my tribute is made up of unfulfilled hopes. Shadows have stolen across the heart of my world and the best in me has lost light. While the fortunate laugh at my penury, I ask you to lend my failings your tears, and so make them precious. I bring you a voiceless instrument. I strained to reach a note which was too high in my heart, and the string broke. While masters laugh at the snapped cord, I ask you to take my lute in your hands and fill its hollowness with your songs.
THE FRUITS COME in crowds into my orchard, they jostle each other. They surge up in the light in an anguish of fullness. Proudly step into my orchard, my queen, sit there in the shade, pluck the ripe fruits from their stems, and let them yield, to the utmost, their burden of sweetness at your lips. In my orchard the butterflies shake their wings in the sun, the leaves tremble, the fruits clamour to come to completion.
