Let Spanish verse turned on my tongue affirm
Once more what Spanish verse has always said
Since Latin spoke through Seneca: the dread
Law that all things are fodder for the worm.
Let it return to sing of pallid ash,
The pomp of death and the triumphant stride
Of that bombastic queen whose feet abash
The trampled banners of our petty pride.
Not that. I’ll cravenly deny not one
Thing that has been a blessing to my dust.
I know that there is no oblivion,
I know that in eternity there lie
The burning, precious things that I have lost:
That forge, that risen moon, that evening sky.
Translated by A.Z. Foreman
”Ewigkeit”: German for “Eternity”.