Let My Beloved Die!!

The wind whistles, the thunder roars, and lightning snatches at the pitch-black sky
as terror snatches at my heart!...

Here is my beloved son tossing in my arms... here is my adored child,
crying and clamoring, tossing about in his thirst for me!...

He is thirsty; he wants to drink all the life that wells from my breast — and I
am thirsty like him, but his great love cannot slake my thirst!...

What dreadful tragedy is storming inside me? What sweeping passion undoes me at this hour
and crushes me?...

My husband deceived me, and I came to loathe him; he humbled my pride, and I came to hate him; he went to such lengths
in tormenting and persecuting me that I fell in love with another man, and now, between my duty to my beloved
and my duty to my son, I stand stripped of strength, my wits flown; madness
all but destroys my mind!...

My brave, beautiful beloved cries out to me, saying: Leave your husband and your son
and follow me...

And my helpless, poor child clings to me with all his might, and his pleading eye says:
Mother dear, do not forsake me!...

And I, between my beloved and my child, tear my heart and tear my mind, and I cannot
hide the feeling of shame that rises from my blood and suddenly fills the emptiness of my soul!...

Yes... my son's love is not enough for me... my child's love does not quench
my burning thirst... the love of the fruit my womb brought to flower cannot console me for
the love of the fruit that is desired in me!...

And here I am now, quaking and quivering... here I am now, suffering and trembling.
I must decide, I must cut the knot, I must choose...
Either I forsake my son this very hour and follow my beloved, or I betray my heart,
break my word, and deliver my beloved to death with my own hand!...

He is waiting now... waiting for me!...

And if the hour passes and he despairs of me, he will take his own life from sheer grief and die
cursing me!...

No... I will not let him die... I will rise... I will go... here is
my dress, and my coat, and the letter I wrote to my husband, and the bag I packed
this morning — but... where is my son?... He is no longer in my arms...
He has slipped free of me... parted from me... I laid him down myself on his little bed while I,
absent-minded, was thinking of my beloved! A kiss, O life of my life!... Another kiss, O
fruit of my body... and of my soul!...

He smiles... he laughs... he cries... he stretches out his arms and calls me!...

Ah! What is this I feel? What is this fire that streams from his adored being and burns me?

No... no... I cannot... I will stay...

Let my beloved die... and let my son live....