Rest!  A guest for once.  Not always having to be 
one's own host with meager provisions. 
Not always grasping at things with hostile feelings;
for once to let everything happen to oneself and to know -
whatever happens is fine. 
Courage also needs to stretch itself 
once in a while and relax 
under the finery of silken blankets.  
Not to be a soldier all the time. 
To wear one's hair loosely 
and the collar wide open 
and to sit on silk armchairs 
and everything to perfection: 
the feeling after the bath. 
To learn again what women are. 
And how the white ones act,
and how the blue ones are; 
what their hands are like, 
how they sing their laughter, 
when blond lads bring the beautiful bowls, 
heavy with juicy fruits.

It began as a meal.  And it turned into a feast; 
you'd hardly know how. 
The high flames torched up, the voices flew about, 
confused songs clattered out of glass and brightness, 
and finally out of the ripened measures: 
the dance emerged.  And it swept everyone along with it.  
What a crashing of waves there was in the halls, 
what a meeting each other, choosing each other, 
saying of good-byes and finding each other again, 
reveling in the bright lights and being blinded by lights 
and swaying in the summer winds 
that are in the dresses of warm women.  
Out of dark wine and a thousand roses 
the hour pours itself roaringly into the dream of the night.

And one stands and stares at this glory. 
And he is the kind that waits to see whether he will wake up. 
Because only during one's sleep does one see such finery, 
and such festivities of such women:
their smallest gesture is a dropping broquaded pleat.  
They build up hours out of silvery conversations, 
and sometimes they raise their hands in such a way -,
you have to think that somewhere 
where you cannot reach they are breaking off gentle roses 
that you cannot see. And there you dream: 
To be adorned with them 
and be with other joys 
and to earn yourself a crown 
for your forehead, which is empty.