RICARDO REIS (FERNANDO PESSOA) ~

 

O D E S (1914-1917)

107      [6 August 1923]

All I want of life is not to know it.

Anyone whom Fate has set down in life must accept

        The various successive forms

        Taken by substanceless life.

There is little point in believing to be eternal

The nothings with which, in our soul, we love

        Other poor nothings

        That [ . . . ]

Grateful to the gods, rather than for the uncertain

Possession of a certain Fantasy, let us take comfort

        In the fleeting energy

        Of instants that do not last.

_______________________

The Complete Works of Ricardo Reis

translated by Margaret Jull Costa & Patricio Ferrari

New Directions 2026

PESSOA ~

 

The Keeper of Sheep

[  23 July 1930 ]

56

Now that I feel love

I'm interested in things that have a scent.

I never used to be interested in the fact that a flower had scent.

Now I experience the scent of flowers as if life were utterly new.

I know perfectly well that they always had a scent, just as I knew that I existed.

These are things one knows out of habit.

But now I know this from the deep in-breath that comes from way back in my head.

Today the flowers taste good to me on a palate that can also smell.

Sometimes when I wake now, smell comes before sight.

Every day I wake full of joy and sorrow.

I used to wake feeling nothing at all; I simply woke.

I feel joy and sorrow because I lose what I dream

But can still inhabit the reality where my dreams live.

I don't know what to do with my sensations,

I don't know what to do on my own.

I want her to say something, anything, so that I can wake again.

_________________

Fernando Pessoa

The Complete Works of Alberto Caeiro

translated from the Portuquese by

Margaret Jull Costa & Patricio Ferrari 

New Directions, 2020

THE COMPLETE WORKS OF ALVARO DE CAMPOS (PESSOA) ~

 

Poems

190

I'm beginning to know myself. I don't exist.

I'm the interval between what I want to be and what others made of me,

Or half of that interval, because there's life too . . .

This, ultimately, is what I am . . .

Turn out the light, close the door, and wait for the sound of those

    slippered footsteps in the corridor to go away.

Let me stay in my room alone with just the great peace and quiet of my self.

A cheap universe.

Fernando Pessoa

The Complete Works of Alvaro de Campos

translated by  Margaret Jull Costa & Patricio Ferrari

New Directions, 2023

R E A D

A LITTLE LONGER THAN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE ~

R E A D      M E

THE BOOK OF DISQUIET ~

Here it is — another edition of the one masterpiece

M O R E !