If I could sink my teeth into the whole earth

XXI

If I could sink my teeth into the whole earth
And actually taste it,
Iʾd be happier for a moment…
But I donʾt always want to be happy.
To be unhappy now and then
Is part of being natural.
Not all days are sunny,
And when rain is scarce, we pray for it.
And so I take unhappiness with happiness
Naturally, just as I donʾt marvel
That there are mountains and plains
And that there are rocks and grass…

What matters is to be natural and calm
In happiness and in unhappiness,
To feel as if feeling were seeing,
To think as if thinking were walking,
And to remember, when death comes, that each day dies,
And the sunset is beautiful, and so is the night that remains…
Thatʾs how it is and how I want it to be …

7 March 1914

PESSOA, Fernando, A Little Larger Than the Entire Universe: Selected Poems, Edited and Translated by Richard Zenith. New York /London, Penguin Books, 2006, p. 28