Apart -- but one remembers the other
Between us flies the white dove of sorrow
Continually carrying news. -- I know when you´re in the garden,
I know when you weep, shut in your quiet room.

I know at what hour the wave of hurt returns,
I know what kind of conversations of people draw a tear.
You are as visible to me as a star glistening afar
Pouring out rose-colored tears, and flashing with a livid spark.

Although my eyes cannot now see you,
Knowing your house -- and the trees of the garden, and the flowers,
My mind´s eye knows where to paint your eyes and figure,
Between which trees to look for your white cloak.

But in vain shall you create landscapes
Silvering them with the moon -- beaming them with daylight.
You do not know that you must knock down the sky and put it
Under the windows, and call the seas the heavens.

Then you must divide the sea and the sky in half,
In the daytime with a veil of bright mountains, at night with cliffs of sapphire;
You know not how with hear of rain you must crown the head of the cliffs,
How to see them in the moon marked off with a pall.

You know not above which mountain will rise the pearl
Which I have chosen for you as a guardian star.
You know not that somewhere far away--even as far as the feet of the mountains,
Beyond the sea -- I spied two lights from the window.

I´ve grown accustomed to them -- I love those sea stars,
Dark expanses with fog, bloodier than the stars of heaven.
Today I see them, I saw them shining yesterday,
They always shine for me -- sadly and palely -- but always...

And you -- eternally shone on the poor wanderer;
But though we never, nowhere shall be united,
Let´s hush a while, and then call each other again
Like two nightingales who are allured by weeping.