the holy longing

Tell a wise person, or else keep silent 

for the massman 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 you are no longer caught 

in this obsession with darkness, 

and a desire for higher love-making 

sweeps you upward.

Distance does not make you falter, 

now, arriving in magic, flying, 

and, finally, insane for the light, 

you are the butterfly and you are the light.

And so long as you haven’t experienced 

this: to die and so to grow, 

you are only a troubled guest 

on the dark earth. 

~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

translation by Robert Bly