BITTER SONG

Nothing troubles my being, but I am sad.
Something slow and dark strikes me,
though just behind this agony,
I have held the stars in my hand.

It must be the caress of the useless,
the unending sadness of being a poet,
of singing and singing, without breaking
the greatest tragedy of existence.

To be and not want to be... that's the motto,
the battle that exhausts all expectation,
to find, when the soul is almost dead,
that the miserable body still has strength.

Forgive me, oh love, if I do not name you!
Apart from your song I am dry wing.
Death and I sleep together...
Only when I sing to you, I awake.