.

 

As when someone shakes a tablecloth
From out of a high window,
And the crumbs, because they fall together,
Make a sound when they fall,
The rain swished down from the sky
And darkened the roads . . .

 

As the bolts of lightning jostled space
And shook the air
Like a large head saying no,
I don’t know why (for I wasn’t afraid),
But I started to pray to St. Barbara
As if I were somebody’s old aunt . . .

 

Ah, by praying to St. Barbara
I felt even simpler
Than I think I am . . .
I felt common and domestic,
As if I’d lived my whole life
Peacefully, like the garden wall,
Having ideas and feelings the same way
A flower has scent and color . . .
I felt like someone who could believe in St. Barbara . . .
Ah, to be able to believe in St. Barbara!

 

(Do those who believe in St. Barbara
Think she’s like us and visible?
Or what then do they think of her?)

 

(What a sham! What do the flowers,
The trees and the sheep know
About St. Barbara? . . . The branch of a tree,
If it could think, would never
Invent saints or angels . . .
It might think that the sun
Illuminates and that thunder
Is a sudden noise
That begins with light . . .
Ah, how even the simplest men
Are sick and confused and stupid
Next to the sheer simplicity
And healthy existence
Of plants and trees!)

 

And thinking about all this,
I became less happy again . .