Liebestod

A poem by Alan Seeger (1888-1916)

I who, conceived beneath another star,

Had been a prince and played with life, instead

Have been its slave, an outcast exiled far

From the fair things my faith has merited.

My ways have been the ways that wanderers tread

And those that make romance of poverty —

Soldier, I shared the soldier’s board and bed,

And Joy has been a thing more oft to me

Whispered by summer wind and summer sea

Than known incarnate in the hours it lies

All warm against our hearts and laughs into our eyes.

I know not if in risking my best days

I shall leave utterly behind me here

This dream that lightened me through lonesome ways

And that no disappointment made less dear;

Sometimes I think that, where the hilltops rear

Their 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 pain

Only 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 day

When 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 though

Eyes 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.

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• Two Lovers And A Beachcomber By The Real Sea by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• Two Campers In Cloud Country by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• Trio Of Love Songs by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• To Eva Descending The Stair by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• To A Jilted Lover by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• Tinker Jack And The Tidy Wives by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Trial Of A Man by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Tour by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Times Are Tidy by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Thin People by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Swarm by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Surgeon At 2 A.M. by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Stones by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Snowman on the Moor by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Sleepers by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Shrike by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Rival by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Ravaged Face by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Rabbit Catcher by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath
• The Queen’s Complaint by Sylvia Plath by Sylvia Plath

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