Journey-fantasy

Halting for a midday rest on the meadow

in the rotting castle's serrated shadow,

in front of the turret spun with ivy,

I pondered on a summer wish,

while I saw a lizard's tail flashing into view

and whisk! disappearing into the cracks.

If it were listening... if it were waiting for me...

if the small door in the wall were to creak...

following the noise of something dragging,

I would find a narrow spiral staircase

and, led upward by a gentle hand,

a goblet of wine ready above...

Then in the bay window we would sit alone,

chatting about nothing in the twilight,

until the pendulum that ticked there stopped moving,

and a blond head nodded in slumber,

and under the thin veil of its lids,

there would stir the wealth of a blue spring...

And the unknown face would wear

the semblance and sister-traits

to all the beauty I ever came across

as I wandered all my earthly paths...

What I had most deeply and tenderly felt

was bound to this blond head

and in this slumbering woman united;

everything that had ever made me happy or tormented me...

Urgently it summoned me to ascend

this spiral staircase with its ruined steps,

so that on the silent lips of whole and full Good Fortune

I might press a quiet kiss...

Just once in all my human life -

yet it will never happen!