Childhood’s End

The time comes for us all
It always comes for us all

"When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things."

Childhood’s end
The child weeps
The time comes
The child sighs
Child alone
Child lost

"Father, father, where are you going
O do not walk so fast.
Speak father, speak to your little boy
Or else I shall be lost,
The night was dark no father was there
The child was wet with dew.
The mire was deep, & the child did weep
And away the vapor flew."

The child is gone
The childish things have been put away
I saw the pain in your eyes
I saw your resolve
I saw you remember those things
I saw you longing to return
I saw your child weep
I saw your child-dream
Your flight back to your childish things
Your longing to return and to re-emerge
A child
You weep outside the mausoleum
The sarcophagus within surrounded by your childish things
Your toys and songs
Your spirit and dance
The time comes for us all
I saw the time come for you and I saw your pain
And I wanted to stave it off for you
I wanted to slow your march to the tomb
I want to save you from weeping

Christ was a child born
A child condemned from birth to the tomb
A child stalked by death and weeping
Why have you forsaken me?

Father, your only son sits weeping in the garden

Father, your child weeps bitter tears
Father, your child hates
Father, your child is lost to time
Father, little tombs await us all

The child weeps
The child lost
The child cold
The child afraid

"Yonder is the grave-island, the silent isle; yonder also are the graves of my youth. There will I carry an evergreen wreath of life." Resolving thus in my heart, did I sail over the sea.- Oh, you sights and scenes of my youth! Oh, all you gleams of love, you divine fleeting gleams! How could you perish so soon for me! I think of you to-day as my dead ones. From you, my dearest dead ones, comes to me a sweet savor, heart opening and melting. Truly, it convulses and opens the heart of the lone seafarer. Still am I the richest and most to be envied - I, the most lonesome one! For I have possessed you, and you possess me still. Tell me: to whom has there ever fallen such rosy apples from the tree as have fallen to me? Still am I your love's heir and heritage, blooming to your memory with many-hued, wild-growing virtues, O you dearest ones! Ah, we were made to remain close to each other, you kindly strange marvels; and not like timid birds did you come to me and my longing - no, but as trusting ones to a trusting one! Yes, made for faithfulness, like me, and for fond eternities, must I now name you by your faithlessness, you divine glances and fleeting gleams: no other name have I yet learnt. Truly, too early did you die for me, you fugitives. Yet did you not flee from me, nor did I flee from you: innocent are we to each other in our faithlessness. To kill me, did they strangle you, you singing birds of my hopes! Yes, at you, you dearest ones, did malice ever shoot its arrows - to hit my heart! And they hit it! Because you were always my dearest, my possession and my possessedness: on that account had you to die young, and far too early! At my most vulnerable point did they shoot the arrow - namely, at you, whose skin is like down - or more like the smile that had at a glance! But this word will I say to my enemies: What is all manslaughter in comparison with what you have done to me! Worse evil did you do to me than all manslaughter; the irretrievable did you take from me: - thus do I speak to you, my enemies! Slew you not my youth's visions and dearest marvels! My playmates took you from me, the blessed spirits! To their memory do I deposit this wreath and this curse. This curse upon you, my enemies! Have you not made my eternal short, as a tone had away in a cold night! Scarcely, as the twinkle of divine eyes, did it come to me - as a fleeting gleam! Thus spoke once in a happy hour my purity: "Divine shall everything be to me." Then did you haunt me with foul phantoms; ah, where has that happy hour now fled! 90 "All days shall be holy to me" - so spoke once the wisdom of my youth: truly, the language of a joyous wisdom! But then did you enemies steal my nights, and sold them to sleepless torture: ah, where has that joyous wisdom now fled? Once did I long for happy auspices: then did you lead an owl-monster across my path, an adverse sign. Ah, where did my tender longing then flee? All loathing did I once vow to renounce: then did you change my close ones and nearest ones into ulcerations. Ah, where did my noblest vow then flee? As a blind one did I once walk in blessed ways: then did you cast filth on the blind one's course: and now is he disgusted with the old footpath. And when I performed my hardest task, and celebrated the triumph of my victories, then did you make those who loved me call out that I then grieved them most. Truly, it was always your doing: you embittered to me my best honey, and the diligence of my best bees. To my charity have you ever sent the most impudent beggars; around my sympathy have you ever crowded the incurably shameless. Thus have you wounded the faith of my virtue. And when I offered my holiest as a sacrifice, immediately did your "piety" put its fatter gifts beside it: so that my holiest suffocated in the fumes of your fat. And once did I want to dance as I had never yet danced: beyond all heavens did I want to dance. Then did you seduce my favorite minstrel. And now has he struck up an awful, melancholy air; alas, he tooted as a mournful horn to my ear! Murderous minstrel, instrument of evil, most innocent instrument! Already did I stand prepared for the best dance: then did you slay my rapture with your tones! Only in the dance do I know how to speak the parable of the highest things: - and now has my grandest parable remained unspoken in my limbs! Unspoken and unrealized has my highest hope remained! And there have perished for me all the visions and consolations of my youth!

"Had I ever heard a dog howl thus?
Yes! When I was a child, in my most distant childhood
the children play, beside the ruined wall, among thistles and red poppies
the coffin burst open, and spouted out a thousand peals of laughter. And a thousand caricatures of children, angels, owls, fools, and childsized butterflies laughed and mocked, and roared
Now will children's laughter ever from coffins flow."

"I heard the word
Wonderful thing
A children's song
the child is father of the man"