Hieltyd minder minsklik, o woeste geast
As der in god wêze moat yn hûs, wêze moat,
Dy’t op de trep en yn de keamers dingen seit,
Lit him dan bewege sa’t op de flier it sinneljocht
Of moanneljocht beweecht, swijend, as de skym fan Plato
Of it skelet fan Aristoteles. Lit him syn stjerren
Uthingje oan de muorre. Hy moat stil ferbliuw hâlde.
Hy moat net prate kinne, sletten wêze, sa’t sy binne:
Sa’t ljocht is, nettsjinsteande al syn beweging;
Sa’t kleur is, al hoe tichteby ús ek;
Sa’t foarmen binne, ek al sizze dy ús oan.
It is de minske dy’t de bûtensteander is,
De minske dy’t gjin neef hat op de moanne.
It is de minske dy’t syn spraak fan bisten
Of fan de ûnmeidielsume massa begeart.
As der in god wêze moat yn hûs, lit him ien wêze
Dy’t as wy prate ús net heart: in koelte,
In fermiljoene neatens, in stikje fan de massa
Dêr’t wy te fier op ôfstân ûnderdiel fan binne.
Less and Less Human, O Savage Spirit
If there must be a god in the house, must be,
Saying things in the rooms and on the stair,
Let him move as the sunlight moves on the floor,
Or moonlight, silently, as Plato’s ghost
Or Aristotle’s skeleton. Let him hang out
His stars on the wall. He must dwell quietly.
He must be incapable of speaking, closed,
As those are: as light, for all its motion, is;
As color, even the closest to us, is;
As shapes, though they portend us, are.
It is the human that is the alien,
The human that has no cousin in the moon.
It is the human that demands his speech
From beasts or from the incommunicable mass.
If there must be a god in the house, let him be one
That will not hear us when we speak: a coolness,
A vermilioned nothingness, any stick of the mass
Of which we are too distantly a part.
Ut Transport to Summer, 1947. YouTube: Wallace Stevens draacht ‘Less and Less Human,