Living Sorrow by the Measure of Joy

 
O my diary of births across countless lives,
do you know that when someone loves another deeply,
they cannot share that person with anyone else?


Yet look at my fate—
I know you belong to another.
You will cherish them, love them—this is society's way,
this is what the world expects. Yet the mere thought
stirs such a fierce storm within me,
leaving me utterly undone!


I know this tempest in my heart is mere emotion.
Don't worry! I am ambidextrous in adapting
to every state and station of my feelings and conscience!


When this emotion torments me so
at seeing you with another,
I think: if only all my work could end right now,
all my debts and duties to this world fulfilled,
and right then my beloved
would send me death's invitation and summon me—
truly, I would depart laughing toward that presence.


Alas, what can I do!
My time has not yet come!
Neither debt nor duty has been settled!
So death does not come—only conscience arrives,
comes and steadies me. And says:
Don't think so much! Say nothing to fate!
If your love is true, then someday
the Creator will surely give you what you long for so.


Someone speaks from within:
Rise! Wake! Don't break and burn!
...Hearing this, I close both eyes!
Mother Earth appears before me.
I think: though I wound her so,
though there is such fire in her breast,
still she bears it all!
She anoints her face with sandalwood fragrance,
and with that fragrance's loving touch gives the world its song of life.


I love, so by joy's measure I paint sorrow in my eyes.