What It Is To Love

Do you know what it is to love?
To cry in your solitude, alone,
to sigh for him through every hour,
and nurse an unfulfilled dream.

Do you know what it is to love?
To see his face everywhere,
to sprinkle kisses across it in your mind,
and call to him with a desperate cry.

Do you know what it is to love?
To feel yourself dying in the night,
to swear tenderness from your heart to him,
while he remains far from your passion.

Do you know what it is to love?
To feel your heart's trembling,
to think you cannot even breathe,
if he is absent, all things wither.

Do you know what it is to love?
To faint, to burn with pain,
to let your soul gather dust,
to wait in anguish, to weep.

Do you know what it is to love?
To rejoice that he still lives,
to think of undressing before him,
and let everything blaze with joy.

I know what it means to love!
Let nothing else exist in this world—
except for him to bathe in
caresses—burning even unto death!