A woman, one of Mary's neighbors
A lamentation
On the fortieth day after His death, all the women neighbors came to the house of Mary to console her and to sing threnodies.
And one of them sang:
- Whereto my Spring, whereto?
- And to what other space your perfume ascending?
- In what other fields shall you walk?
- And to what sky shall you lift up your head to speak your heart?
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- These valleys shall be barren,
- And we shall have naught but dried fields and arid.
- All green things will parch in the sun,
- And our orchards will bring forth sour apples,
- And our vineyards bitter grapes.
- We shall thirst for your wine,
- And our nostrils will long for your fragrance.
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- Whereto Flower of our first spring, whereto?
- And will you return no more?
- Will not your jasmine visit us again,
- And your cyclamen stand by our wayside
- To tell us that we too have our roots deep in earth,
- And that our ceaseless breath would forever climb the sky?
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- Whereto Jesus, whereto,
- Son of my neighbor Mary,
- And comrade to my son?
- Whither, our first Spring, and to what other fields?
- Will you return to us again?
- Will you in your love-tide visit the barren shores of our dreams?
- --oOo-- -