The eagle flew ahead and toward the height,
through starry gateways to the Powers' Throne,
and full of beauty was his kingly flight,
and in the sun his brown feathers shone.
Where had he lived? Perhaps it was a King
who kept him chained, a prisoner, till now,
and he had cried to greet the maiden-spring,
that loved a prince with melancholy brow.
Or maybe in a wizard's gloomy den
when he was looking out the narrow door
the height above enchanted him and then
turned to a sun what was a heart before.
What matters that? The perfect azure heights
unfolded, ever luring him ahead
and ever on he flew, three days and nights
till in his bliss he smothered and was dead.
(…)
Rays of the planets pierced the heavens through
magnificent, divinely frozen rays,
but, never knowing perish, on he flew
and watched those planets with a lifeless gaze.
And more than once worlds tumbled, making room
for more, and the archangel's trumpet came,
and yet alone the eagle's gorgeous tomb
did never fall a victim of the game.
Above the city night is soaring, till
each sound grows softer, duller every chord.
And you, my soul, are keeping silence still,
have mercy for the souls of marble, Lord.
And to this speech my soul did answer give
(as though a harp was singing in the skies):
«Why was I ever made to come and live
within this hum an frame, which I despise?
I hastened towards a glory new and rich,
leaving my home; I must have been insane,
for me this earth is now a ball, to which
the prisoner is fastened with a chain.
And, oh, this love, how I have grown to hate
this illness, of which none on earth are free,
which ever darkens with its shade the fate
of worlds so wondrous, although strange to me.
And if there is one thing that keeps me sealed
to shining planets and to days of old,
that thing is grief, my only trusted shield,
that thing is sorrow, full of scorn, and cold».
II
The clouds were covered with a greenish rust,
the golden sunset turned into gray,
and i addressed my body: «Now you must
reply to all the soul has had to say!»
And to my speech my body answered so —
a common body, but with blood aflame:
«The meaning of this life I do not know,
though I have heard that «love» can be its name.
(…)
A woman, too, I love…but when 1 kiss
her lowered eyes, it is a strange thing,
and I am drunk, and overcome with bliss,
as in a storm, or drinking from a spring.
And yet for all I want or take today,
for all my dreams, and all my joys and sorrow
as well befits a man, I will repay
with that sure peril which will come tomorrow.»
III
And when the word of God was set aflame
as Big Dipper in the darkness blue,
the body and the soul before me canie,
and asked of me: «Who, questioner, are you?»
I lowered at the impudent my eyes,
and slowly condescended to reply:
«Pray, answer, do you think a dog is wise
that howls when the moon is bright on high?
Then can it be for you to question me,
to whom all time since worlds began to flower,
until the day that they will cease to be
is but the smallest fraction of an hour?
Me, who, like lgdrazil, the tree, does grow
through Universes seven times seven,
whose eyes regard as equal dust below
the meadows of the earth and those of Heaven?
I am who sleeps…
I am filled with a sadness by whispering grass —
it will wither, and roses will die and decay,
and your own precious body will also, alas,
be changed into flowers, and turned into clay.
All memory of us will vanish. And then
skilled fingers will fashion a beautiful thing,
a pitcher of clay, which will live once again
and be filled to its wide golden throat at spring.
And someone, perhaps, by the well where they meet
embracing each other, with sunset aglow,
will drop that dear clay, which will slip to her feet
and ring as it breaks into fragments below.
