Ode to Nature

To whom belongs the sun-kissed waterfalls and valleys of the north sprinkled with flowers

‘Tis nature, not fettered by mere mortals wasting away their hours

Beauty and beast have met at last

Now we raise a toast

To the one with tangible power

To whom belongs the skies glittered with gold and the grassy plains stretching as far as the eye can see

‘Tis nature, bewitchingly beautiful to me

The pixies circle around the roses in sombre song

Greeted by the gentle lilt of weeping willows

The festivities have come to a halt

To whom belongs the wild forests choked in ash and shrouded in smoke

‘Tis nature, befallen to the will of frivolous folks oblivious to its woes

The bliss that once prevailed

Is slowly decaying under our feet

Ode to the Swan

There is a swan, tiptoeing across the stage. A white light appears overhead and she leaps for me, leaps and falls, her delicate fingers strained, reaching towards the hanging trees.

Violins chirp lightly, like morning song. Shadows creep in this dark room. The flittering taps of her shoe weave thread into silk, spinning fastera needle in the night. Yet as the dust settles comes the winding melodies of the flute. There is not much time, she rushes towards me. Each wing is torn… In her plight she is open, so sirens may sing.

A haggard beast is looming, he screams “She will not prevail!”

I turn to the swan; who is this coming outwards? A flower in the wind? When will the angel, who favours the haze, join her in this dance? The beast is pacing. Crimson shoes, tap to me! Tap to me!

And even if one of them suddenly pressed me against his heart, I should fade in the strength of his stronger existence. For Beauty’s nothing but beginning of Terror we’re still just able to bear, and why we adore it so is because it serenely disdains to destroy us. Every angel is terrible.

… Does Gaspara Stampa mean enough to you yet, and that any girl, whose beloved has slipped away, might feel, from that far more intense example of loving: ‘Could I but become like her!’? Should not these oldest suffering be finally growing fruitfuller for us? Is it not time that, in loving, we freed ourselves from the loved one, and, quivered, endured: as the arrow endures the string, to become, in the gathering out-leap, something more than itself? For staying is nowhere.

- ZH