Rockface, submit with thunder and noise
under my heavy hammer blows!
Down here I must make my way
until the very ore obeys.

Down to the desolate night of the depths
I am drawn by the rich treasure:
diamonds and jewels,
amid lodes of red gold.

And in the depths I find peace,
eternal peace and quiet.
Cleave a passage, my hammer,
to the hidden chamber of the heart.

Once I was a happy youth:
under the open skies
I walked paths of flowers,
I owned the peace of childhood.

But I laid aside the delight of daylight,
and in the dark midnight
forgot the sights and sounds of nature
in the temple vaults of the mine.

When first I entered here
I innocently thought that
the spirits of the deep would solve
the eternal mystery of life.

But no spirit has taught me
what I dearly desired,
no ray of enlightenment
has struck me from out of the rock.

Have I erred? Is this not
the path to enlightenment?
And now the light of the outside world -
blinds me.

No, I must go down:
there is eternal peace.
Cleave a passage, my hammer
to the hidden chamber of the heart.

Hammer blow and hammer blow,
to the last day of my life.
No ray of morning sun,
no dawn of hope I meet down here.