I Fall

By: Fernando Pessoa

I FALL full length into all life,
And my lust for living roars within me.
No pleasures in the world can equal
The stupendous joy of one who can't tell it
Except by rolling on the ground in the grass and the daisies,
Mingling with the dirt until his suit and hair are dirty . . .
There are no verses that can grant this.
Pluck a blade of grass, bite into it, and you will understand,
You will completely understand what I incompletely express.
I crave to be a root
Pursuing my inner sensations like a sap . . .
I'd like to have all the senses -- including
My intellect, imagination and inhibition --
On my skin's surface so that I could roll over the rough ground
More deeply within, feeling more roughness and bumps.
I'd be satisfied if my body were my soul,
For only then would all winds, all suns and all rains
Be felt by me in the way I'd like.
This being impossible, I despair, I rage,
I wish I could gnash at my suit
And have a lions tough claws to rip at my flesh
Until the blood would flow, flow, flow, flow  . . .
I suffer because all of this is absurd,
As if I could scare somebody
With my hostile feeling toward destiny, toward God,
Which arises when we confront the Ineffable
And suddenly perceive our weakness and smallness.

You can find this poem in — Fernando Pessoa and Co.: Selected Poems

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