The shepherd in love lost his staff,
And the sheep scattered over the slope.
And so lost was he in thought that he didn't even play his flute.
No one came or went. He never found his staff.
Other men, cursing him, rounded up the sheep.
He had not, after all, been loved.
When he stood up from the slope and the false truth, he saw everything;
The wide valleys full of the same shades of green as always,
The tall mountains in the distance, more real than any feeling,
All of reality, with the sky and air and fields that exist,
And he felt the air reopen, with pain, a freedom in his chest.