THE HOURI AND THE POET

THE HOURI:
You neither relish wine nor even look at me.
Strange that you do not know the ways of amity.
In every song you sing, in every breath you draw,
There is a quest, a pining for things yet to be.
O what a fair world you have fashioned with your song.
It makes me feel as if Heaven were illusory.

THE POET:
With your barbed tongue you waylay simple mortal men;
But mortal thorns give mortal men far sweeter pain.
What can I do ? I cannot stay at rest, for I
Am like the zephyr blowing over hill and plain.
As soon as my gaze comes to iest on a fair face
My heart begins to yearn for a still fairer one.
From spark to star, from star to sun, progressively –
Such is my flight. To-stop would be sheer death for me.
When I rise, having quaffed a cup of vernal wine,
I sing a song of yet another spring to he.
I seek the end of that which has no end at all
With ever-hopeful heart and never-wearied eye.
The hearts of lovers die in an eternal Heaven –
With no grief, none to share it with, no plaintive cry.