A bird, dead

At the window pane

A nightingale with a slit throat

And a heart that ceased

Asking

Covered

In the blood of dawn

These  then are

The world and its beauties

The coolness of the desert night

Froze your blood

Your young startling

Flowerlike blood

Which you exchanged

Stark little sparrow

For the happiness

Of your illusion

This then, o fortune

Is the price of your joys

This then, o dream

Your bitter end

This then is

What appeared perfection

In the sweet breeze of the summer

Your hair knew the freedom

Of the wind

That sings in the ports

Its songs to madden the heart

For irrespressible is it

And to the prisoner's soul

Eventhough her cage may be golden

It is death

This then

Is what you found

The lethal angel of white dawn

Struck your heart

After its last song

And your lips

Sealed forever

Like your eyes

That saw a world in chains

Froze in their last

And final

No

This then is

The flower of life

It wilts, alas!

Too soon

And truth obliterates

All secrets

Speak now and sing

O living voice

From heart to heart

Of the pain of the forgotten

Who shall forever remember

Grant me, O God

To live beyond death

Grant me to understand

When the nightingale in her flight

Shed her weight

And broke free of the world

The world remained

What is was

And with the force of gravity

And its iron law

With all the might of its yoke

In her hour of triumph

It lashed back at her

A tiny bird she

That with broken wings

Tumbled

Deep as truth

Is the abyss

Go on singing then beyond death

My sweet voice

Tell those that outlived you

What it means to live on

Break free with them

For the first time

For the first time now

Sing