wells? The world sleepeth-

  Ah! Ah! The dog howleth, the moon shineth. Rather will I die, rather
will I die, than say unto you what my midnight-heart now thinketh.

  Already have I died. It is all over. Spider, why spinnest thou
around me? Wilt thou have blood? Ah! Ah! The dew falleth, the hour
cometh-

  -The hour in which I frost and freeze, which asketh and asketh and
asketh: "Who hath sufficient courage for it?

  -Who is to be master of the world? Who is going to say: Thus shall
ye flow, ye great and small streams!"

  -The hour approacheth: O man, thou higher man, take heed! this
talk is for fine ears, for thine ears- what saith deep midnight's
voice indeed?

                            5.

  It carrieth me away, my soul danceth. Day's-work! Day's-work! Who is
to be master of the world?

  The moon is cool, the wind is still. Ah! Ah! Have ye already flown
high enough? Ye have danced: a leg, nevertheless, is not a wing.

  Ye good dancers, now is all delight over: wine hath become lees,
every cup hath become brittle, the sepulchres mutter.

  Ye have not flown high enough: now do the sepulchres mutter: "Free
the dead! Why is it so long night? Doth not the moon make us drunken?"

  Ye higher men, free the sepulchres, awaken the corpses! Ah, why doth
the worm still burrow? There approacheth, there approacheth, the
hour,-

  -There boometh the clock-bell, there thrilleth still the heart,
there burroweth still the wood-worm, the heart-worm. Ah! Ah! The world
is deep!

                            6.

  Sweet lyre! Sweet lyre! I love thy tone, thy drunken, ranunculine
tone!- how long, how far hath come unto me thy tone, from the
distance, from the ponds of love!

  Thou old clock-bell, thou sweet lyre! Every pain hath torn thy
heart, father-pain, fathers'-pain, forefathers'-pain; thy speech
hath become ripe,-

  -Ripe like the golden autumn and the afternoon, like mine
anchorite heart- now sayest thou: The world itself hath become ripe,
the grape turneth brown,

  -Now doth it wish to die, to die of happiness. Ye higher men, do
ye not feel it? There welleth up mysteriously an odour,

  -A perfume and odour of eternity, a rosy-blessed, brown,
gold-wine-odour of old happiness.

  -Of drunken midnight-death happiness, which singeth: the world is
deep, and deeper than the day could read!

                            7.

  Leave me alone! Leave me alone! I am too pure for thee. Touch me
not! Hath not my world just now become perfect?

  My skin is too pure for thy hands. Leave me alone, thou dull,
doltish, stupid day! Is not the midnight brighter?

  The purest are to be masters of the world, the least known, the
strongest, the midnight-souls, who are brighter and deeper than any
day.

  O day, thou gropest for me? Thou feelest for my happiness? For
thee am I rich, lonesome, a treasure-pit, a gold chamber?

  O world, thou wantest me? Am I worldly for thee? Am I spiritual
for thee? Am I divine for thee? But day and world, ye are too coarse,-

  -Have cleverer hands, grasp after deeper happiness, after deeper
unhappiness, grasp after some God; grasp not after me:

  -Mine unhappiness, my happiness is deep, thou strange day, but yet
am I no God, no God's-hell: deep is its woe.

                            8.

  God's woe is deeper, thou strange world! Grasp at God's woe, not
at me! What am I! A drunken sweet lyre,-

  -A midnight-lyre, a bell-frog, which no one understandeth, but which
must speak before deaf ones, ye higher men! For ye do not understand
me!

  Gone! Gone! O youth! O noontide! O afternoon! Now have come
evening and night and midnight,- the dog howleth, the wind: