THE DOORWAY

Too many times have I passed through the doorway.

It rises so high and is erased in sunlight,
and under the arch one hears passing
eternal winds in eternal spaces.
The threshold is made of promise-stones, the staircase to an
                                               altar,
to which he slips through who consecrates himself to a gift
with his past time and his time to come
and a will that is whole.

Too many times have I passed through the doorway.

And yet I pray:

Watchman at the door, lord of all beginning,
let me through! I still have strength.
As truly as I never hid anything away,
take, but take to the last fragment.
The day I divide, the day I reckon,
bar my way and cast me into the melting-oven.
All is a door. All is a beginning.
The axle of life is in your hands.

Whole I pass under the dizzying arch,
and eternal winds in eternal spaces
drink my gift.

For more information, please visit the website of David McDuff and his own pages with the translations.