Where lies sweet hope when passion bars love’s way

And petty quarrels set once-kind hearts aflame,

Smoke rising like dark clouds to choke the day,

Descending soon as thunder-scolded rain?

Soon words, like waves by distant tempests stirred,

Lash out in rage upon the rugged shore

As each stands firm, in bitter pride deferred,

To drown the other in a blustery storm.

Where is the beacon when the blackened sky

And scornful winds bring hope down to its knees?

When love’s a storm-tossed sailor, left to die,

Clinging to flotsam on relentless seas—

There battered hope survives to still hold on

The stoutest stones that love once rested on.