Life’s beginning!
Where does it hover?
From where do we come?
Long ago that question arose.
Abundance of fruitfulness
then embraced the earth.
Nature sank in the
quiet of ripe rye,
with yellow garments
the earth adorned herself
and with gold the fields shone,
tranquil in the sun’s caresses.
Then harshly blew the north,
letting loose a whirlwind,
and everything was scattered;
even the young shoots of rye
were cast to the ground
so that in the empty spaces
the fruit rolled,
the wailing of the uprooted whistled and
howled.
At that time,
in the dark night,
the two went to the mountains
and huddling listened for
death’s trumpet.
Long stood they trembling.
Suddenly,
the black clouds rolled
apart,
a clear blue
opening appeared,
and a small radiance peered at them:
“Do you see me?
I am tiny.
and I am far, far away.
But look,
I am coming closer to the two of you
closer and closer—
and when the snowflakes begin to
fall, tickling the earth,
and when hoarfrost needles
glitter in the air of the sun’s
beams,
and when the skylark begins
to twitter in spring,
and when the earth spreads
petals on the seas,
and when the sun turns
her face toward the north,
I will descend to you.”
And again the clouds gathered,
and the whirlwind raged even more,
sensing that futile was
his wrestling with eternal life.
They both remembered well
that black night.
And they pondered—where is life’s
beginning, from where do we come.
They pondered separately,
each to self,
and sometimes she would ask
her friend in love,
but he too
could answer nothing.
Now midsummer’s moonlight
cooled the heated earth,
and the two still pondered about that
miraculous glimpse
and found no answer.
