I like my office in downtown
When business is looking well,
And my hut in the countryside
When they're failures with one leap.

The businessman in me builds
And strives, while the poet in me
Watches the course of events
And trends and pleasantly smiles.

When I'm running office I contract,
And when I'm out of office I versify;
And, usually, it is good lyric poetry,
But I must keep it out of my associates.

I guess, most of them do all the same;
That explains why almost all statesmen
And top managing leaders write poetry,
And why almost all collect works of art.

Poetry occupies in me the better and
Greater half. For me, like morphine,
Is strangely benumbing and therefore
Strangely soothing; it relieves headaches.

Thus my poetry and my worship of nature
Serve me as handsomely in times of trouble
And disorder as the businessman in me
Serves well in times of success and merging.

In that way these two things provide me with
A safe retreat for my heart and a balm for soul,
While body is submitted to tribulations and woe.
The lyric poetry alone makes its austere course, and
Its romanticism saves us from a negative attitude to life.