Initiation

You arenʾt asleep under the cypress trees,
For in this world there is no sleep.
…………………………………………………………….
Your body is the shadow of the clothes
That conceal your deeper self.

When night, which is death, arrives,
The shadow ends without having been.
And you go, unawares, into that night
As the mere outline of yourself.

But at the Inn of Wonderment,
The Angels take away your cape;
You continue with no cape on your shoulders
And little else to cover you.

Then the Highway Archangels
Strip you and leave you naked,
Without any clothes, with nothing:
You have just your body, which is you.

Finally, deep within the cave,
The Gods strip you even more.
Your body, or outer soul, ceases,
But you see that they are your equals.
………………………………………………………….

The shadow of your clothes remains
Among us in the realm of Destiny.
You are not dead amid cypress trees.
………………………………………………………..
Neophyte, there is no death.

23 May 1932

PESSOA, Fernando, A Little Larger Than the Entire Universe: Selected Poems, Edited and Translated by Richard Zenith. New York /London, Penguin Books, 2006, pp. 317-318