Give me just one summer, stark sisters,
One more autumn to ripen my song.
Then I’ll gladly die, my heart filled
With that sweet music.

The soul, which never had its godly rights
In life, won’t find peace either.
When just once the sacred lies down
In my heart, the poem will find perfection.

Then I will welcome the world
Of silence and shadows and happily leave
My song behind—once you’ve lived
Like the gods, what else is there?


-Friedrich Holderlin-