Liebestod
I who, conceived beneath another star,Had been a prince and played with life, insteadHave been its slave, an outcast exiled farFrom the fair things my faith has merited.My ways have been the ways that wanderers treadAnd those that make romance of poverty—Soldier, I shared the soldier’s board and bed,And Joy has been a thing more oft to meWhispered by summer wind and summer seaThan known incarnate in the hours it liesAll warm against our hearts and laughs into our eyes.
I know not if in risking my best daysI shall leave utterly behind me hereThis dream that lightened me through lonesome waysAnd that no disappointment made less dear;Sometimes I think that, where the hilltops rearTheir white entrenchments back of tangled wire,Behind the mist Death only can make clear,There, like Brunhilde ringed with flaming fire,Lies what shall ease my heart’s immense desire:There, where beyond the horror and the painOnly the brave shall pass, only the strong attain.
Truth or delusion, be it as it may,Yet think it true, dear friends, for, thinking so,That thought shall nerve our sinews on the dayWhen to the last assault our bugles blow:Reckless of pain and peril we shall go,Heads high and hearts aflame and bayonets bare,And we shall brave eternity as thoughEyes looked on us in which we would seem fair—One waited in whose presence we would wear,Even as a lover who would be well-seen,Our manhood faultless and our honor clean.