The Seven Seals (Or: The Yes and Amen Song)

1

If I am a soothsayer and full of that soothsaying spirit which wanders on a high ridge between two seas—

wanders between past and future as a heavy cloud—hostile to sultry lowlands and to everything that is weary and can neither die nor live:

ready for lightning in its dark bosom and for the redeeming beam of light, pregnant with lightnings that say Yes! and laugh Yes!, ready for soothsaying lightning bolts:—

—but blessed is the one who is pregnant in this way! And truly, whoever is one day to kindle the light of the future must hang long on the mountain like a heavy storm!—

Oh, how should I not lust for eternity and for the wedding ring of rings, the ring of return!

Never yet have I found the woman by whom I would want children, unless it be this woman whom I love: for I love you, O eternity!

For I love you, O eternity!

2

If my wrath ever broke open graves, moved boundary stones, and rolled old tablets, broken, into steep depths:

If my mockery ever blew away moldered words, and I came like a broom to the cross spiders and as a sweeping wind to old, musty burial chambers:

If I ever sat exulting where old gods lie buried, blessing the world, loving the world, beside the monuments of old slanderers of the world:—

—for I love even churches and the graves of God, once the sky looks with clear eyes through their broken roofs; I like to sit on broken churches like grass and red poppies—

Oh, how should I not lust for eternity and for the wedding ring of rings, the ring of return!

Never yet have I found the woman by whom I would want children, unless it be this woman whom I love: for I love you, O eternity!

For I love you, O eternity!

3

If ever a breath came to me from the creative breath, and from that heavenly necessity which compels even chances to dance star-dances:

If I ever laughed with the laughter of the creative lightning, which the long thunder of the deed follows, rumbling but obedient:

If I ever played dice with gods at the gods’ table of the earth, so that the earth quaked and broke and snorted up rivers of fire:—

—for the earth is a gods’ table, trembling with creative new words and gods’ throws of the dice:—

Oh, how should I not lust for eternity and for the wedding ring of rings, the ring of return!

Never yet have I found the woman by whom I would want children, unless it be this woman whom I love: for I love you, O eternity!

For I love you, O eternity!

4

If I ever drank in full draughts from that foaming jug of spice and mixture in which all things are well mixed:

If my hand ever poured the farthest to the nearest, and fire to spirit, and joy to suffering, and the worst to the kindest:

If I myself am a grain of that redeeming salt which makes all things mix well in the mixing jug:—

—for there is a salt that binds good with evil; and even the most evil is worthy to be used as spice and for the last foaming over:—

Oh, how should I not lust for eternity and for the wedding ring of rings, the ring of return!

Never yet have I found the woman by whom I would want children, unless it be this woman whom I love: for I love you, O eternity!

For I love you, O eternity!

5

If I am fond of the sea and of everything that is of the sea’s kind, and fondest of all when it angrily contradicts me:

If that seeking joy is in me which drives the sails toward the undiscovered, if a seafarer’s joy is in my joy:

If my exulting ever cried: “The coast has vanished—now the last chain has fallen from me—

“—the boundless roars around me, far out space and time glitter for me, well then! up! old heart!”—

Oh, how should I not lust for eternity and for the wedding ring of rings, the ring of return!

Never yet have I found the woman by whom I would want children, unless it be this woman whom I love: for I love you, O eternity!

For I love you, O eternity!

6

If my virtue is a dancer’s virtue, and I have often leaped with both feet into golden-emerald rapture:

If my malice is a laughing malice, at home among rose slopes and hedges of lilies:

—for in laughter all that is evil is together, but sanctified and absolved by its own bliss:—

And if this is my alpha and omega, that everything heavy should become light, every body a dancer, every spirit a bird: and truly, that is my alpha and omega!—

Oh, how should I not lust for eternity and for the wedding ring of rings, the ring of return!

Never yet have I found the woman by whom I would want children, unless it be this woman whom I love: for I love you, O eternity!

For I love you, O eternity!

7

If I ever spread out still skies above me and flew with my own wings into my own skies:

If I swam playfully in deep distances of light, and bird-wisdom came to my freedom:—

—but thus speaks bird-wisdom: “Behold, there is no above, no below! Throw yourself about, out, back, you light one! Sing! speak no more!

“—are not all words made for the heavy? Do not all words lie to the light one! Sing! speak no more!”—

Oh, how should I not lust for eternity and for the wedding ring of rings, the ring of return!

Never yet have I found the woman by whom I would want children, unless it be this woman whom I love: for I love you, O eternity!

For I love you, O eternity!