"The Holy Longing"

Tell a wise person or else keep silent.

For the mass man will mock it right away.

I praise what is truly alive,

What longs to be burned to death.

               

In the calm waters of the love nights

Where you were begotten

Where you have begotten

A strange feeling comes over you

When you see the silent candle burning.

Now, no longer caught

In the obsession with darkness

Desire for higher love-making

Sweeps you upward.

Distance does not make you

Falter now, flying

Arriving in magic

You are the moth and you are gone.

So long as you have not

Experienced this:

To die and so to grow

You are only a troubled guest

On the dark earth.

Goethe

"One ought, everyday at least ...."

“One ought, everyday at least, to hear a little song, read a good poem, see a fine picture and, if it were possible, to speak a few reasonable words.”

Blessed Longing

Blessed Longing

Tell no-one else, only the wise,

For the crowd will sneer at once.

I wish to praise what is fully alive,

What longs to flame towards death.

When the calm enfolds the love-nights

That created you, where you have created

A feeling from the Unknown steals over you,

While the tranquil candle burns.

You remain no longer caught

In the penumbral gloom

You are stirred and new, you desire

To soar to higher creativity.

No distance makes you ambivalent.

You come on wings, enchanted

In such hunger for light, you

Become the butterfly burnt to nothing.

So long as you have not lived this:

To die is to become new,

You remain a gloomy guest

On the dark earth.