Not, not mine: it's somebody else's wound. I could never have borne it. So take the thing that happened, hide it, stick it in the ground. Whisk the l… - Anna Akhmatova

There is a frontier-line in human closeness
That love and passion cannot violate — Though in silence mouth to mouth be soldered
And passionate devotion cleave the heart.

Here friendship, too, is powerless, and years
Of that sublime and fiery happiness
When the free soul has broken clear
From the slow languor of voluptuousness.

Those striving towards it are demented, and
If the line seem close enough to broach — Stricken with sadness...Now you understand
Why my heart does not beat beneath your touch.

For some the wind can fleshly blow, for some the sunlight fade at ease, but we, made partners in our dread, hear but the grating of the keys, and heavy-booted soldiers' tread. As if for early mass, we rose and each day walked the wilderness, trudging through silent street and square, to congregate, less live than dead.

All as before: against the dining-room windows Beats the scattered windswept snow, And I have not changed either, But a man came to me. I asked: "What do you want?" He replied: "To be with you in Hell." I laughed: "Oh, you'll foredoom Us both to disaster."