When pinched by the winter frost;
My heart hailed thee friend
With bliss and with fear,
When thy first glance fell on me sweetly
All I had seen appeared strange;
Friendless were my surroundings;
I never seemed to have known
Any one who came nigh.
Thee, however,
Straightway I knew,
And I saw thou wert mine
When I beheld thee:
What I hid in my heart,
All I am,
Clear as the day
Dawned to my sight
Like tones to the ear
Echoing back,
When, upon my frosty desert,
My eyes first beheld a friend.
[She hangs enraptured on his neck, and looks him close in the face.
SIEGMUND [Transported.
O rapture most blissful!
Woman most blest!
SIEGLINDE [Close to his eyes.
O let me, closer
And closer clinging,
Discern more clearly
The sacred light
That from thine eyes
And face shines forth,
And so sweetly sways every sense!
SIEGMUND
The May-moon's light
Falls on thy face
Framed by masses
Of waving hair.
What snared my heart
'Tis easy to guess:
My gaze on loveliness feasts.
SIEGLINDE
[Pushing the hair back from his brow, regards him with astonishment.
How broad and open
Is thy brow!
Blue-branching the veins
In thy temples entwine.
I hardly can endure
My burden of bliss.—
Of something I am reminded:—
The man I first saw to-day
Already I have seen!
SIEGMUND
A dream of love
I too recall;
I saw thee there
And yearned for thee sore!
SIEGLINDE
The stream has shown me
My imaged face—
Again I see it before me;
As in the pool it arose
It is reflected by thee.
SIEGMUND
Thine is the face
I hid in my heart.
SIEGLINDE [Quickly averting her gaze.
O hush! That voice!
O let me listen!
These tones as a child
Surely I heard—
But no! I heard the sound lately,
When, calling in the wood,
My voice re-echoing rang.
SIEGMUND
To sweet and melodious
Music I listen!
SIEGLINDE [Gazing into his eyes again.
And ere now thy glowing