Softly, softly, stealing through time,
Softly, softly, hearts entwine.
Softly, softly, crossing time and space,
Softly, softly, two hearts embrace.
Through death’s doorway I catch your breath … no more in life!
My lament echoes through the ether … no more in life!
No more can my fingers touch your face.
No more can my arms clasp in heartfelt embrace.
No more! No more! For I dwell in one world,
you now another, separated, divided, yet united by grief.
Oh, what great cataclysm divides!
Oh, what great and unutterable sorrow enmeshes!
Oh, what encompassing darkness now enshrouds you, you,
whose heart is married to mine; you, now gone, now dead.
I keen! I keen! My heart is rent, my world bereft.
You my harbour, you whose blood flowed in mine, you whom I love.
I keen! I keen! Oh, what calamity is this!
Softly, softly, stealing through time,
Softly, softly, hearts entwine.
Softly, softly, crossing time and space,
Softly, softly, two hearts embrace.
But wait. I see you. There.
There you lie prostrate in your grief as I do in mine.
Our grief has woken the slumbering and transcended time.
Your heart is broken … I cannot bear the grief; it surely cannot be borne.
It fills my soul to overflowing.
I am drowning, I am drowning without you my love, I am drowning.
But I am here. I have come like the dawn unto the moonlit sky,
I have come, I have come to you.
You feel me, you know me, yes, it is I.
You feel me, you know me, come from on High.
Ah my heart, my heart! My love’s sweet desire!
Your soul quickens as my love enfolds you and you know, you know, I am come.
My love enfolds you and you know I am here, enabled
to come from the evermore, enabled to love you from beyond death’s door.
And then the rent once again, the sharp divide, the familiar
anguished gasp of breath and waste of soul.
Not again! Not again! No, my love not again! Don’t leave!
I will die a thousand deaths, I will die a thousand deaths, no, not again.
Our grief becomes the plaintive shrill of unbearable separation
and I feel our sorrow echoing in a fathomless void, and amidst the
resounding darkness of our torment I hear our words; “Stay”, she says, “Come”, he says.
Softly, softly, stealing through time,
Softly, softly, hearts entwine.
Softly, softly, crossing time and space,
Softly, softly, two hearts embrace.
… stay … come … stay …
… come … stay … come ….
… stay … come … stay … come …
Here now.
Here. Now.