Text excerpted from Oscar Wilde's book-length letter to Lord Alfred "Bosie" Douglas.

Dear Bosie:

After a long and fruitless waiting of two years without a single line from you I am determined to write to you myself.  As I sit here in Reading Gaol after a trial and sentence that has brought me public ruin and infamy, the memory of our affection is often with me. Yet I will begin by telling you that I blame myself for allowing such a friendship as ours, devoid of all intellect and based solely on pleasure, to dominate my life.  To think that loathing, bitterness and contempt should forever take the place in my heart once held by love is very sad to me.  But as I look back over our time together I realize that you were destructive to my work as an artist.
Drama, novel, poem in prose, poem in rhyme, subtle or fantastic dialogue, whatever I touched I made beautiful.  I made Art a philosophy and philosophy an Art. I had the ability to alter the minds of men.
Nevertheless, during the entire time we were together, because of your constant claim on my attention and time, I never wrote a single line.  As long as you were by my side my life was entirely sterile and uncreative. The basis of character is will power and mine became subject to yours.  In your case one had to either give up to you, or give you up.  There was no alternative. You even convinced and goaded me into a libel suit against your father. The consequences of these actions leave me in tears in this terrible place.  But I must keep love within me, or how else should I live another day?  Love is fed by the imagination, by which we become wiser than we know, better than we feel, nobler than we are.  Only what is fine and finely conceived can feed love.  But anything will feed hate. 

Hate blinds people.  You were not aware of that.  Subtly, silently, and in secret, Hate gnawed at your nature.  Your terrible lack of imagination, the one really fatal defect of your character, was entirely the result of the Hate that lived in you.  That faculty in you which Love would have fostered, Hate poisoned and paralysed.  The aim of Love is to love, no more, no less.  For my own sake there was nothing for me to do but to love you.   I knew, if I allowed myself to hate you, that in the dry desert of existence over which I had to travel, and am traveling still, every rock would lose its shadow, every palm tree be withered, every well of water prove poisoned at its source.  Are you beginning now to understand a little?  Is it beginning to dawn on you what love is?  It is not too late for you to learn, though to teach it to you I may have had to go to a convict’s cell.
After my terrible sentence, when the prison dress was on me, and the prison house closed, I sat amidst the ruins of my wonderful life, crushed by anguish, bewildered with terror, dazed by pain.  But I would not hate you.   No matter what your conduct was to me, I always felt that at heart you loved me far better than anyone else.  But you, like myself, have had a terrible tragedy in your life, though one of an entirely opposite character to mine.  In you hate was always stronger than love.  Your hatred of your father was of such stature that it entirely outstripped, overthrew and overshadowed your love of me.  You did not realize there was no room for both passions in the same soul.
And the end of it all is that I have got to forgive you.  I must do so.  I don’t write this letter to put bitterness in your heart, but to pluck it out of mine.  “Forgive your enemies” is not for the sake of the enemies, but for one’s own sake because Love is more beautiful than Hate.

I am to be released, if all goes well with me, towards the end of May.  I know that much is waiting for me outside that is very delightful, from what St. Francis of Assisi calls “my brother the wind, and my sister the rain,” down to the shop-windows and sunsets of great cities.   I hope to be with my friends, and to gain, in their healthful and affectionate company, peace, and balance, and a less troubled heart, and a sweeter mood.  I have a strange longing for the great simple primeval things, such as the Sea, to me no less of a mother than the Earth.
I tremble with pleasure when I think that on the very day of my leaving here both the laburnum and the lilac will be blooming in the gardens, and that I shall see the wind stir into restless beauty the swaying gold of one and make the other toss the pale purple of its plume.  For me, to whom flowers are part of desire, there are tears waiting in the petals of some rose.
The final mystery is oneself. When one has weighed the sun in the balance and measured the steps of the moon, and mapped out the seven heavens, star by star, there still remains oneself.  Perhaps I am chosen to teach you something much more wonderful: the meaning of sorrow and its beauty.

Six poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay

Mechthild von Magdeburg: Minnelieder an got (2005)

From “Das Fließende Licht der Gottheit” by Mechthild von Magdeburg (ca. 1210-1282)

ENGLISH TRANSLATION BY MICHAEL  RESLER

I.    Prayer

Wir loben dich, herre, das du úns hast gesuchet mit diner demutekeit.
We praise you, Lord, that you have sought us out in your humility.
Wir loben dich, herre, das du úns hast behalten mit diner barmeherzekeit.
We praise you, Lord, that you have harbored us with your mercy.
Wir loben dich, herre, das du úns hast geheret mit diner [güete.]
We praise you, Lord, that you have glorified us with your kindness.
Wir loben dich, herre, das du úns hast gefuoret mit diner miltekeit.
We praise you, Lord, that you have nourished us with your bounty.
Wir loben dich, herre, das du úns hast geordent mit diner wisheit.
We praise you, Lord, that you have instructed us with your wisdom.
Wir loben dich, herre, das du úns hast beschirmet mit diner gewalt.
We praise you, Lord, that you have sheltered us with your might.
Wir loben dich, herre, das du úns hast gehelget mit diner edelkeit.
We praise you, Lord, that you have sanctified us with your grandeur.
Wir loben dich, herre, das du úns hast gewiset mit diner heimlichkeit.
We praise you, Lord, that you have shown us the path with your intimacy.
Wir loben dich, herre, das du úns hast gehoehet mit diner minne.
We praise you, Lord, that you have ennobled us with your love.

II.   Recitative

Seiest wilkomen, liebú tube,
Welcome, precious dove,
Du hast so sere geflogen in dem ertriche,
So far and wide have you flown in this earthly realm
Das dine vedern sint gewahsen in das himelriche.
that your feathers have expanded into the kingdom of heaven.
Du smekest als ein wintrúbel,
Your taste is that of a grape from the vineyard,
Du rúchest als ein balsam,
Your fragrance is that of balsam,
Du lúhtest als dú sunne,
You shimmer as does the sun,
Du bist ein zuonemunge miner hoehsten minne.
You are the increase of my most exalted love.

III.   Aria

O du giessender got an diner gabe,
O you God who spills over with your gifts,
O du vliessender got an diner minne,
O you God who flows with your love,
O du brennender got an diner gerunge,
O you God who burns with your desire,
O du smelzender got an der einunge mit dinem liebe,
O you God who melts in the union with your beloved,
O du ruowender got minen brústen!
O you God who finds repose on my breasts!
Ane dich ich nút wesen mag!
Without you I cannot live on!

O du schoene rose in dem dorne,
O you rose lovely amongst the thorns,
O du vliegendes bini in dem honge,
O you bee darting about in the honey,
O du reinú tube an dinem wesende,
O you dove pure in your essence,
O du schoenú sunne an dinem schine,
O you sun lovely in your radiance,
O du voller mane an dinem stande!
O you full moon in your grandeur!
Ich mag mich nit von dir gekeren.
From you I cannot turn aside.

IV.   Chorale

In der groesten sterki kumt si von ir selber,
In the greatest strength she loses herself,
In dem schoensten liehte ist si blint an ir selber
In the loveliest light she is blind even to herself,
Und in der groesten blintheit sihet si allerklarost.
And in the greatest blindness she sees most clearly.
In der groesten klarheit ist si beide tot und lebende.
In the most boundless clarity she is both living and dead.

V.   Meditation

Ie si langer tot ist, ie si vroelicher lebt;
The longer she is dead, the more joyously she lives;
Ie si vroelicher lebt, ie si mer ervert;
The more joyously she lives, the more she embraces;
Ie si minner wirt, ie ir mer zuoflússet;
The more she withers, the more flows to her;
Ie si sich mere vorhtet.
The more she lives in fear.
Ie si richer wirt, ie si armer ist;
The more wealth she accrues, the more destitute she is;
Ie si tieffer wonet, ie si breiter ist;
The more basely she dwells, the more expansive she is;
Ie si gebietiger ist.
The greater is her dominion.
Ie si me arbeitet, ie si sanfter ruowet;
The more she toils, the more gently does she find rest;
Ie si me begriffet.
The more she comprehends.
Ie sin lust me wahset,
The more his longing grows,
Ie ir [hochzit] groesser wirt;
The more bounteous their festival becomes;
Ie das minnebet enger wirt,
The more cramped the love-bed becomes,
Ie die umbehalsunge naher gat;
The more intimate the embrace;
Ie das muntkússen suesser smekket,
The sweeter the taste of their lips,
Ie si sich minneclicher ansehent;
The more lovingly do they behold one another;

Ie si sich noeter scheident,
The more anguished is their parting,
Ie mer er ir gibet;
The more abundant is his gift to her;
Ie me si verzert, ie me si hat;
The more she consumes, the more she does have;
Ie si demueteklicher urlop nimt,
The more humbly she takes her leave,
Ie e si wider kumt;
The sooner does she return;
Ie si heisser blibet,
The more ardent she remains,
Ie si e entfunket;
The sooner does she break out in flames;
Ie si mere brennet, ie si schoener lúhtet;
The more she burns, the more splendidly does she glimmer;
Ie gottes lob mer gebreitet wirt,
The more widespread God’s praise is made,
Ie ir girheit groesser blibet.
The more fervent remains her longing.

IX.    AGNUS DEI

    Agnus Dei qui tollis peccata mundi, miserere nobis.
    Dona nobis pacem.