If death prevails in the bravery Of bronze, stone, earth, and immense sea, Can beauty survive, Having the flower's strength to devastate? How can the scent of summer Stop the strong siege of these days, If doors of steel and hard rocks Cannot defeat Time's tyranny? Where to hide—atrocious meditation—The gold that Time wants in its ark? What hand can stop its swift foot, Or what beauty does Time not demarcate? None! Unless this love of mine Keeps its splendor in black ink.