Tired of the sad hospital and of the foul incense

That rises against the commonplace whiteness of the curtains

Toward the huge crucifix bored by the empty wall

There the sly dying man straightens his old back,

Drags himself and goes, less to warm his decay

Than to see the sun on the stones, to paste

The white hairs and the bones of a meager figure

On the windows that a lovely clear beam wants to tan

And his mouth, feverish and of voracious blue azure

That young one, he went to inhale his treasure

A virginal skin and from the past.  To soil

From a long bitter kiss the warm golden stone floors.

Drunk, he lives, forgetting the horror of holy oils,

The herb teas, the clock, and the imposed bed,

The cough, and when the evening bleeds among the tiles,

His eye, on the light-drenched horizon

Sees golden galleys, beautiful as swans

On a river of purple and perfumes sleeping

In rocking the wild lightning and rich in their lines

In a great indifference loaded with memory!

Thus, taken by disgust of the man with the harsh soul

Sprawled on happiness, where his only appetites

Eat, and who persists in searching this refuse

To offer the woman suckling her children,

I flee and I cling to all the windows

From which one turns a shoulder to life and, blessed,

In their glass, washed of eternal dew,

That gilds the chaste mornings of Infinity

I see myself and find I am an angel! And I die, and I love

-- Whether the window is art, or mysticism –

To come back to life, carrying my dream in a crown

In the previous sky where Beauty flowered!

But alas, here below is the master: dread of it

Sometimes makes me lose heart, until this safe haven

And the impure vomiting of Stupidity

Forces me to hold my nose in front of the azure

Is there a way, o Self who knows bitterness

To push the crystal by the offended monster

And run away from me, with my two featherless wings

--At the risk of falling throughout eternity?

04/26/2008