The Holy Longing

By: Goethe

Art: Henri Prestes

Tell a wise person or else keep silent
for those who do not understand
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 creeps over you
as you watch the silent 
candle burning.

Now you are no longer caught
in the obsession with darkness
and a desire for higher lovemaking
sweeps you upwards.

Distance does not make you falter,
now, arriving in magic, flying
and finally insane for the light
you are the butterfly, and 
you are gone.

And so long as you have not 
experienced this:
to die and so to grow
you are only a troubled guest
on the dark earth.