Venezia

The black swallows will return
to hang their nests on your balcony,
and once again will knock in play
against your window panes;
but those that stopped their flight and perched
to observe your beauty and my good luck,
those who learned to know our names...
those... will not return!

The honeysuckle will return,
to climb the walls in your garden,
and open once again at evening
their even more beautiful flowers,
but those blooms that were full of dew
where we saw the trembling drops
fall like tears of the day ...
those... will not return!

Ardent words of love will return
to sound and resound in your ears;
and your heart from the depths of sleep
perhaps will wake again;
but silent, absorbed, on bended knee,
as men worship God at His altar,
as I have loved you ... make no mistake,
they'll not love you like that!