I reached up into the top of the closet
and took out a pair of blue panties
and showed them to her and
asked "are these yours?"

I love, alas! yet am not loved,
For cruel she to pity is not moved.
My constant love with scorn she ill rewardeth,
Only my sighs a little she regardeth:
Yet more and more the quenchless fire increaseth,
Which, to my greater torment, never ceaseth.

I love you means I love all.
I love you means I love both great and small.

Love begins at home and home means you.
You are ever old, you are ever new.

Losing her again and again,
I look for her here and there.
Getting her again and again,
I lose her now and then.

I live, and yet methinks I do not breathe,
I thirst, and drink, and drink, and thirst again,
I sleep, and yet I dream I am awake,
I hope for that I have; I have and want:
I sing and sigh; I love and hate at once.
Oh! tell me, restless soul, what uncouth jar
Doth cause such want in store, in peace such war?

I like to wash,
the dust of this world
In the droplets of dew.

I know you little, I love you lots,
my love for you could fill ten pots,
fifteen buckets, sixteen cans,
three teacups, and four dishpans.

I know 'tis but a Dream, yet feel more anguish
Than if 'twere Truth. It has been often so:
Must I die under it? Is no one near?
Will no one hear these stifled groans and wake me?

I know a man
who photographed the view he saw
from the window of the room where he made love
and not the face of the woman he loved there.


Translated by Chana Bloch

Jeg er et lille venligt Minde,
Og holder for min største Lykke,
Naar fra dit Øielaag, Veninde,
Jeg tør en hellig Taare trykke -