A Human Life Is A Story Told

Sharp Knives Seemed To Cut Her Delicate Feet, Yet She Hardly Felt Them, So Deep Was The Pain In Her Heart. She Could Not Forget That This Was The Last Night She Would Ever See The One For Whom She Had Left Her Home And Family, Had Given Up Her Beautiful Voice, And Had Day By Day Endured Unending Torment, Of Which He Knew Nothing At All. An Eternal Night Awaited Her.

Far Out In The Ocean, Where The Water Is As Blue As The Prettiest Cornflower, And As Clear As Crystal, It Is Very, Very Deep; So Deep, Indeed, That No Cable Could Fathom It: Many Church Steeples, Piled One Upon Another, Would Not Reach From The Ground Beneath To The Surface Of The Water Above. There Dwell The Sea King And His Subjects.

Far Away, Where The Swallows Take Refuge In Winter, Lived A King Who Had Eleven Sons And One Daughter, Elise. The Eleven Brothers--they Were All Princes--used To Go To School With Stars On Their Breasts And Swords At Their Sides. They Wrote Upon Golden Slates With Diamond Pencils, And Could Read Just As Well Without A Book As With One, So There Was No Mistake About Their Being Princes. Their Sister Elise Sat Upon A Little Footstool Of Looking-glass, And She Has A Picture-book Which Had Cost The Half Of A Kingdom. Oh, These Children Were Very Happy; But It Was Not To Last Thus Forever.

She Thought, "he Whom I Love More Than My Father Or Mother, He Of Whom I Am Always Thinking, And In Whose Hands I Would So Willingly Trust My Lifelong Happiness. I Dare Do Anything To Win Him And To Gain An Immortal Soul.

Well, Yes: People Write Poems When They Are In Love, But A Wise Man Will Not Print Them.