I Must Accept but Can't What Cannot Be

Music: Serenade for Strings.
By Antonin Dvorak.
Performed by The Advent Chamber Orchestra at the Free Music Archive
under a Creative Commons Attribution/ShareAlike license.

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I must accept but can't what cannot be.
I see you and my heart dissolves in pain.
You are not dead, but you are dead to me.

What happened to our love's a mystery.
I rummage through our empty past in vain.
I must accept but can't what cannot be:

That someone else now shares your off-hand "we,"
Now feels your tender tongue all feeling drain . . .
You are not dead, but you are dead to me.

I cannot lay aside my agony:
Again, again I play the same refrain.
I must accept but can't what cannot be.

And yet I know this tortured ecstasy
Is just my way of holding you again.
You are not dead, but you are dead to me,

And still I cannot bear to set you free,
That of our love some remnant might remain.
I must accept but can't what cannot be.
You are not dead, but you are dead to me.

Copyright by Nicholas Gordon. Free for personal or non-commercial use.



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