On the willows there, we hung up our lyres

He takes another drink of tea and thinks about being afraid even to think about what he felt for Percival, because God was present in his mind. How at night he would count Percival's heartbeats and long for his own to stop. He thinks about the loneliness of not being able to tell Percival, of having to hold it all in his heart, a shameful weight always on his shoulders. He nods again.