The Straying Boat

Whither are you straying with your little boat, young sailor?
Do you not see the raging of the storms, all but hurling you into the heart of this deep?
And the waves about you — do you not see how they toy with you and rise up in their haughtiness,
as though boasting of their power over you? Then how soon they crash, in their pride, against the age-old rocks scattered there on the near bank?
O sailor! What has called you to forsake the safe shore and venture out alone in your little boat, on such a day as this?
Has your soul wearied of people and of their clamor, so that you chose rather to hazard yourself and face the gales and the tempests?
Does the quivering face of the water, gazing up at your dark, mournful countenance...
does it know what loneliness and pain your soul enfolds?
Turn your face toward my balcony, O sailor: you will see me lonely like you, and with as much pain in me as there is in you!..
But my boat, which used to carry me daintily over the waters of this sea, was wrecked years ago; so I have stayed here on the balcony, content to watch the others among men passing by in their boats..
Whither are you straying with your little boat, young sailor?