spring ballad

✂ I am the proudest of thieves -
with a golden ring round my hair
I sett off, when the sun sets,
to steal all I want -
my gliding pace
is in itself the mocking unhearable fanfare
of my dangerous night -

✂ I am the proudest of thieves -
I despise all work,
I scorn all toiling for money and food -
I can love only
the darting strength in my limbs,
the unbroken growth of my beauty -

✂ with a golden ring round my hair
I set off, when the sun sets,
to steal what the ugly have worked -
and with stolen garments
on my wonderful shoulders,
when the sun just rises,
I break the door of my sweet-heart -

✂ and in naked pride of my own,
when the sun is treading
on the working backs of the ugly,
I throw to my sweet-heart
the gleaming prey of the night -
and she smiles like the queen of queens -,
she is a grand thief too,
the magnificent vanity
which my sweet-heart is -

✂ I am the proudest of thieves -
when the sun roars its day-song,
my hair will sparkle like stolen diamonds
over the world of bent backs -
when the sun is singing and the day is high,
my wonderful love is my own -