At first we did not plan to love;
books of lieder piled by pianos did not exist,
planning itself was all;
shadowy and hungry, we wanted to survive;
it surprised us when our race turned beautiful and tall
and now even taller contestants for beautiful daughters
made pleas. Mothers tearfully assented
as fat husbands peered from the waters.
Time knew there was time for love
and even the buried dreamed of love—
that’s what all did when they were sacrificed,
though no one said what the sacrificed were thinking;
only the lucky imagined,
and people held still for the sacrifice.
In helpless wonder and humility
after the fighting, weary under the trees,
the prophets, old, broken, knew
life would argue, trends of modernity flash,
but nothing—nothing—would stop you.