Song
Song - meaning Summary
Longing Without Possession
The poem explores quiet, unspoken longing for a person never possessed. The speaker imagines mutual sleepless yearning and wonders whether such longings can be carried without being overwhelmed. Contrasting performative lovers who quickly lie, the poem emphasizes solitude and imagination: memories and fleeting sensations—wind, fragrance, cradle—fail to secure what is absent. The final image claims an inward possession: though never held, the beloved is continually held and reborn inside the speaker.
Read Complete AnalysesYou, whom I do not tell that all night long I lie weeping, whose very being makes me feel wanting like a cradle. You, who do not tell me, that you lie awake thinking of me:-- what, if we carried all these longings within us without ever being overwhelmed by them, letting them pass? Look at these lovers, tormented by love, when first they begin confessing, how soon they lie! You make me feel alone. I try imagining: one moment it is you, then it's the soaring wind; a fragrance comes and goes but never lasts. Oh, within my arms I lost all whom I loved! Only you remain, always reborn again. For since I never held you, I hold you fast.
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