In Sweden there stands a grey tower,
Sheltering owls, eagles;
For nine hundred years it has
Sported with rain, lightning and storm;
Whatever of humankind lived therein,
With joy and sorrow, has long passed away.

Rain is streaming, a rider approaches,
He digs his spurs into the horse's flanks.
He has lost his way
In twilight and in thought.
The forest writhes, howling in the wind
Like a whipped child.

The tower has an evil reputation in the land,
That at night, by bright light,
A spirit walks in monk's garb,
With a sad visage;
And whoever gazes into the monk's eyes
Becomes sad and wishes to die.

But without fear and dread the rider
Steps into the vaulted tower.
He leads his black stallion in with him
And merrily jokes with his horse:
"We would rather take our chances
With spirits than with wind and showers, eh?"

The saddle and the wet bridle
He unbuckles from his horse.
In the desolate room he spreads
His coat upon the ground
And blesses yet the ashes
Of the hands that built so watertight [a building].

And as he sleeps and as he dreams,
At the hour of midnight
His horse awakens him - it snorts and rears,
Bright is the tower round.
The wall glows as if on fire;
The man musters his heart.

The horse's nostrils are hugely dilated,
In fear it shows its teeth,
Trembling, the stallion beholds the ghost
And his mane stands on end;
Now the rider too sees the spirit
And crosses himself in the customary way.

The monk has come to stand before him,
So sorrowfully still, so eerie, 
As if through him the whole world wept mutely,
So sad, oh how sad!
The wanderer gazes at him fixedly
And is overcome with sympathy.

The great and secret sorrow
That shudders through nature,
That a bleeding heart may discern,
That despair perceives,
But never reaches - that pain appears
In the eye of the monk; the rider weeps.

He cries: "Oh tell, what grieves you?
What so deeply moves you?"
But as the monk bows his head,
And begins to move his pale lips
In order to articulate the immense [sorrow],
[The rider] calls out in horror:  "Speak not! Speak not!"

The monk disappeared, the day dawns greyly,
The wanderer departs;
But forthwith he utters not a sound,
Of death alone he is forced to think.
The black stallion touches no food,
The horse and rider are doomed.

And as the sun sinks in the evening,
Their hearts beat more anxiously,
The monk seems to beckon from every bush,
And all the leaves lament,
All the air around is wounded and sore -
The black stallion slowly walks into the lake.