It will be as a matter of fate for my kin,
They will wish to kill him, when he comes with his brothers.
It is different for me than it is for him.
Faolán is on one island, I on another.
That island is steadfast, hidden in fen,
its native folk are the fiercest of men.
They will wish to kill him, when he comes with his brothers.
It is different for me than it is for him.
I thought of my Faolán and the hopes he smothered,
and I sat in tears, whenever it rained,
yet when I was in his bold arms engirdled,
I dwelled in pleasure, and drowned in pain.
O Faolán, my Faolán, my hopes have curdled
into a sickness, how rarely you stay,
my anxious spirit, not hunger for food.
Do you hear me, protector? A wolf steals away
into the woods with our wretched brood.
What was unjoined may easily sever,
our song, our poem, our story together.
Left in the Lurch 
NOTE: The above is a translation of the Old English poem “Wulf and Eadwacer”. The original poem is notable for being one of the most ambiguous complete poems in the surviving Old English corpus, for a multitude of reasons, and it has been subject to many wildly varying interpretations. As much as I love ambiguity, one needs a grounding when translating, so I chose a very specific interpretation of the poem’s meaning and translated with that in mind. I also took some broad liberties with the form, giving it an off-kilter balladic feel, but that’s just me playing around. This is just one reading of the poem that seems truthful to me, but I would encourage you to read other versions, as they may resonate better with you. Thank you for reading this very long caveat.