No lo es todo el Amor: no es carne o vino
ni reposo o un techo cuando llueve;
ni tabla salvadora si uno se hunde
y emerge y hunde, emerge y vuelve a hundirse;
aire no da el Amor al pulmón ahogado,
ni quita sangre o cura un hueso roto;
pese a ello el hombre intima con la muerte
aun al hablar, por mi falta de amor.
Pudiera ser que en un difícil trance
fija en mi pena, suplicando un cese,
o por fastidio, hacer mi voluntad
me obligara a vender tu amor por paz,
comerciar esta noche por comida.
Puede ser. Mas no creo que lo haría.
Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink
Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain;
Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink
And rise and sink and rise and sink again;
Love can not fill the thickened lung with breath,
Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone;
Yet many a man is making friends with death
Even as I speak, for lack of love alone.
It well may be that in a difficult hour,
Pinned down by pain and moaning for release,
Or nagged by want past resolution's power,
I might be driven to sell your love for peace,
Or trade the memory of this night for food.
It well may be. I do not think I would.
Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950)
