Afridi Love

Since, Oh, Beloved, you are not even faithful

To me, who loved you so, for one short night,

For one brief space of darkness, though my absence

Did but endure until the dawning light;

Since all your beauty–which was _mine_–you squandered

On _that_ which now lies dead across your door;

See here this knife, made keen and bright to kill you.

You shall not see the sun rise any more.

Lie still! Lie still! In all the empty village

Who is there left to hear or heed your cry?

All are gone to labour in the valley,

Who will return before your time to die?

No use to struggle; when I found you sleeping,

I took your hands and bound them to your side,

And both these slender feet, too apt at straying,

Down to the cot on which you lie are tied.

Lie still, Beloved; that dead thing lying yonder,

I hated and I killed, but love is sweet,

And you are more than sweet to me, who love you,

Who decked my eyes with dust from off your feet.

Give me your lips; Ah, lovely and disloyal

Give me yourself again; before you go

Down through the darkness of the Great, Blind Portal,

All of life’s best and basest you must know.

Erstwhile Beloved, you were so young and fragile

I held you gently, as one holds a flower:

But now, God knows, what use to still be tender

To one whose life is done within an hour?

I hurt? What then? Death will not hurt you, dearest,

As you hurt me, for just a single night,

You call me cruel, who laid my life in ruins

To gain one little moment of delight.

Look up, look out, across the open doorway

The sunlight streams. The distant hills are blue.

Look at the pale, pink peach trees in our garden,

Sweet fruit will come of them;–but not for you.

The fair, far snow, upon those jagged mountains

That gnaw against the hard blue Afghan sky

Will soon descend, set free by summer sunshine.

You will not see those torrents sweeping by.

The world is not for you. From this day forward,

You must lie still alone; who would not lie

Alone for one night only, though returning

I was, when earliest dawn should break the sky.

There lies my lute, and many strings are broken,

Some one was playing it, and some one tore

The silken tassels round my Hookah woven;

Some one who plays, and smokes, and loves, no more!

Some one who took last night his fill of pleasure,

As I took mine at dawn! The knife went home

Straight through his heart! God only knows my rapture

Bathing my chill hands in the warm red foam.

And so I pain you? This is only loving,

Wait till I kill you! Ah, this soft, curled hair!

Surely the fault was mine, to love and leave you

Even a single night, you are so fair.

Cold steel is very cooling to the fervour

Of over passionate ones, Beloved, like you.

Nay, turn your lips to mine. Not quite unlovely

They are as yet, as yet, though quite untrue.

What will your brother say, to-night returning

With laden camels homewards to the hills,

Finding you dead, and me asleep beside you,

Will he awake me first before he kills?

For I shall sleep. Here on the cot beside you

When you, my Heart’s Delight, are cold in death.

When your young heart and restless lips are silent,

Grown chilly, even beneath my burning breath.

When I have slowly drawn my knife across you,

Taking my pleasure as I see you swoon,

I shall sleep sound, worn out by love’s last fervour,

And then, God grant your kinsmen kill me soon!

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Poems in English 

• Meg Merrilies poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Lines On The Mermaid Tavern poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Lines from Endymion poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Lines poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Last Sonnet poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• La Belle Dame Sans Merci poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Keen, Fitful Gusts are Whisp’ring Here and There poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Isabella or The Pot of Basil poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• John Keats – John Keats Poems by John Keats
• In Drear-Nighted December poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• If By Dull Rhymes Our English Must Be Chain’d poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Hyperion poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Hymn To Apollo poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• How Many Bards Gild The Lapses Of Time! poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Hither, Hither, Love poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• His Last Sonnet poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Happy Is England! I Could Be Content poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Give Me Women, Wine, and Snuff poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Fragment of an Ode to Maia poem – John Keats poems by John Keats
• Fill For Me A Brimming Bowl poem – John Keats poems by John Keats

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Search engines:

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Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.

Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.

 

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