Béguinage-Sainte Elisabeth, Bruges

I.

These high gates do not seem to guard or hold

(the bridge goes gladly in and out the same),

and yet they're all secure inside this old

and high-elmed, open close. The only time

they leave their house is when they walk this strip

of grass to church, to get a better grip

on why there's so much love inside them here.

All veiled in spotless linen, there they kneel,

alike as if one image made them real

a thousand times in chorus. Deep and clear,

the sound comes off the patterned pillars ringing.

The voices go on mounting higher, singing

higher always, casting their last words

high up from where no words could go on, towards

the angels who will not return them. Down

below, when they un-kneel without a sound

(crossing themselves first with the sign of God),

they leave in silence, reaching, with a nod

toward waiting holy water. Fingers dip;

the water chills the brow and pales the lip.

And then they go, subdued and calmly-souled.

They walk back down that strip the way they came

(the young are steady, but behind the fold,

an agèd nun comes straggling up, half-lame),

back to their house where quickly they're concealed.

and through the elms, from time to time, one may

perceive pure loneliness — the slightest ray.

In one small pane, it flares and is revealed.

II.

The window of this church: what is projected

from it to the courtyard through each pane

(a thousand)? Silence passes through the stain;

quenched sunshine blurs, fantastically reflected,

distended, mixed, and ageing like old wine.

Dort legt sich, keiner weiß von welcher Seite,

Außen auf Inneres und Ewigkeit

auf Immer-Hingehn, Weite über Weite,

erblindend, finster, unbenutzt, verbleit.

Dort bleibt, unter dem schwankenden Dekor

des Sommertags, das Graue alter Winter:

als stünde regungslos ein sanftgesinnter

langmütig lange Wartender dahinter

und eine weinend Wartende davor.

They're lying there, though on which side, none knows:

the Outer, Inner, and Eternity;

the Endless and all Vastness, great and wide

and leaded; blinded; dark; ready to be.

Beneath the wavering colors, summer keeps

the old, gray winter. It's as if some kind

of patient man, with his long-suffering mind,

were standing stock-still, waiting there behind;

before, a patient, waiting woman weeps.