IN THE LIBRARY
As she sat facing me the other dayReading a book, while I was writing verses,Or rather trying to, for I could notDetach my gaze from her bewitching visage,Nor could my mind in rhythmic furrows flow,Pursuing thoughts to her all unrelated,When like the heaving billows that are yieldingTo the attracting powers of the moon,My every thought by her has been attracted.I thus bethought me: “Wherefore write I poems,When here, before me, breathes a living poem,Compared to whom, all poems are as dustBesides a sweetly smelling, blooming flower.”So I lay down my pen and gazed at her.
As she sat facing me the other dayReading a book, while I was writing verses,Or rather trying to, for I could notDetach my gaze from her bewitching visage,Nor could my mind in rhythmic furrows flow,Pursuing thoughts to her all unrelated,When like the heaving billows that are yieldingTo the attracting powers of the moon,My every thought by her has been attracted.I thus bethought me: “Wherefore write I poems,When here, before me, breathes a living poem,Compared to whom, all poems are as dustBesides a sweetly smelling, blooming flower.”So I lay down my pen and gazed at her.
As she sat facing me the other dayReading a book, while I was writing verses,Or rather trying to, for I could notDetach my gaze from her bewitching visage,Nor could my mind in rhythmic furrows flow,Pursuing thoughts to her all unrelated,When like the heaving billows that are yieldingTo the attracting powers of the moon,My every thought by her has been attracted.I thus bethought me: “Wherefore write I poems,When here, before me, breathes a living poem,Compared to whom, all poems are as dustBesides a sweetly smelling, blooming flower.”So I lay down my pen and gazed at her.
As she sat facing me the other day
Reading a book, while I was writing verses,
Or rather trying to, for I could not
Detach my gaze from her bewitching visage,
Nor could my mind in rhythmic furrows flow,
Pursuing thoughts to her all unrelated,
When like the heaving billows that are yielding
To the attracting powers of the moon,
My every thought by her has been attracted.
I thus bethought me: “Wherefore write I poems,
When here, before me, breathes a living poem,
Compared to whom, all poems are as dust
Besides a sweetly smelling, blooming flower.”
So I lay down my pen and gazed at her.