I’m free at last, my wife is dead!
I’ll drink till all my craving’s spent.
When I came home without a cent,
Her cries carved through my every thread.

I’m happy as an emperor;
Air is pure, sky full of spirit…
We had a summer quite like it
The day I fell in love with her!

The fearsome thirst that carves me up
Would need before its currents thin
As much wine as could be borne in
Her tomb; —it’s not a tiny cup:

I tossed her down a long well’s span,
And even pushed upon her all
The stones surrounding; none were small.
—I will forget her if I can!

By every tender vow and sigh
No power can unbind us from,
To join our souls in one bright sum
As in the days when we were high,

I begged her for a date again,
At night, by roads where few steps ring.
She came there! —foolish, crazy thing!
We’ve all gone more or less insane!
She still looked sweet, although our strife
Had worn her down! and as for me,
I loved her too much! that, I see,
Is why I told her: Leave this life!

None can understand me. That crowd
Of brainless drunkards, each one caught
In morbid darkness: which one thought
To craft from wine a liquid shroud?

The wasted, deaf to all appeal
Like steel machines’ unyielding form,
In any season, cold or warm,
Have never known a love that’s real,

Its black enchantments, ceaseless train
Of cruel alarms a demon steers,
Its poison vials, its heavy tears,
Its clatterings of bone and chain!

—Here I am by myself, unbound!
I’m going to get dead drunk tonight;
And then, without remorse or fright,
I’ll sprawl down there upon the ground,

And I will sleep there like a dog!
The cart whose massive wheels will thud,
Piled high with stones and clods of mud,
The raging traincar, iron clog,
Can crush my guilty head till diced,
Cut me in half like spades part sod,
I’ll mock my fate as I would God,
The Devil, or the Blood of Christ!