The temples of the gods are forgotten or in ruins: Professors are still arguing about the past and the future: I am sick of reading marginal notes on life, I am weary of following false banners: I desire nothing more intensely or completely than this present; There is nothing about me you are more likely to notice than my being: Let me therefore rejoice silently, A golden butterfly glancing against an unflecked wall. XXXII Today you shall have but little song from me, For I belong to the sunlight. This I would not barter for any kingdom. I am a wheeling swallow, Blue all over is my delight. I am a drowsy grass-blade In the greenest shadow. XXXIII My desire goes bristling and growling like an angry leopard; My ribs are a hollow grating, my hair is coarse and hard, My flanks are like sharp iron wedges, my eyes glitter as chill glass; Down below there are the meadows where my famished hopes are feeding, I will waylay them to windward, stalking in watchful patience, I will pounce upon them, plunging my muzzle in the hot spurt of their blood. XXXIV The flag let loose for a day of festivity; Free desperate symbol of battle and desire, Leaping, lunging, tossing up the halyards; Below it a tumult of music, Above it the streaming wastes of the sky, Pinnacles of clouds, pyres of dawn, Infinite effort, everlasting day. The immense flag waving Aloft in glory: Over seas and hilltops Transmitting its lightnings. XXXV What weave you, what spin you, What wonder win you, You looms of desire? Sin that is splendour, Love that is shameless, Life that is glory, Life that is all. XXXVI Like cataracts that crash from a crumbling crag Into the dull-blue smouldering gulf of a lake below, Landlocked amid the mountains, so my soul Was a gorge that was filled with the warring echoes of song. Of old, they wore Shining armour, and banners of broad gold they bore: Now they drift, like a wild bird's cry, Downwards from chill summits of the sky. Fountains of flashing joy were their source afar; Now they lie still, to mirror every star. In circles of opal, ruby, blue, out-thrown, They drift down to a dull, dark monotone. Pluck the loose strings, singer, Thrum the strings; For the wind brings distant, drowsy bells of song. Loose the plucked string, poet, Spurn the strings, For the echoes of memory float through the gulf for long.