Two people pass through the cold and barren wood;
The moon races along, as they regard it.
The moon races above towering oaks;
no clouds veil the light of heaven
into which their black limbs reach.
A woman's voice speaks:

I'm carrying a child, and it isn't yours,
I walk in sin here beside you.
I've brought deep harm upon myself.
I no longer believed in a happy future
and yet had a deep desire for a
complete life, for the joy of motherhood
and its responsibilities. Then I was foolhardy;
I allowed, shivering, my virtue
to be taken by a stranger; 
and even gloried in it. 
Now life has taken its revenge:
Now you, oh you, have I met.

She walks awkwardly;
Looks upward, the moon races along.
Her dark expression is drowned in light.
A man's voice speaks:

The child you have conceived,
let it not be a burden to your soul. 
Look, how brightly the universe glitters!
There is a radiance surrounding everything. 
You are adrift with me upon a cold sea;
Yet a singular warmth flickers 
from you into me, and from me into you.
It will transfigure this unknown child;
You will bear it for me, as if it were from me.
You have caused a radiance within me,
You have made me, myself, a child again.

He grasps her fully around the waist,
Their breaths kiss each other in the breeze.
Two people pass through the lofty, luminous night.