Paradise.

Wyeth, Ides of March, 1974

I WANT to SLEEP

I shall be still stronger.

Still clearer, purer, so let

The sweet invasion of oblivion come on.

I want to sleep.

If I could forget myself, if I were only

A tranquil tree.

Branches to spread out the silence.

Trunk of mercy.

The great darkness, grown motherly,

Deepens little by little.

Brooding over this body that the soul —

After a pause — surrenders.

It may even embark from the endless world.

From its accidents.

And, scattering into stars at the last.

The soul will be daybreak.

Abandoning myself to my accomplice.

My boat,

I shall reach on my ripples and mists

Into the dawn.

I do not want to dream of useless phantoms,

I do not want a cave.

Let the huge moonless spaces

Hold me apart and defend me.

Let me enjoy so much harmony

Thanks to the ignorance

Of this being, that is so secure

It pretends to be nothing.

Night with its darkness, solitude with its peace.

Everything favors

My delight in the emptiness

That soon will come.

Emptiness, O paradise

Rumored about so long:

Sleeping, sleeping, growing alone

Very slowly.

Darken me, erase me.

Blessed sleep.

As I lie under a heaven that mounts

Its guard over me.

Earth, with your darker burdens.

Drag me back down.

Sink my being into my being:

Sleep, sleep.

Jorge Guillen