Here lies one who thought himself to be  

The best poet in all humanity;  

Through life he had no joy or rest.  

In many songs his madness was expressed.  

At whatever age he might have died  

Too long he lived, too much he tried.  

He dwelt in weak self-centredness.  

His heart was torn by endless stress  

Of thought and feeling split apart.  

In all things he bore an enemy's heart.  

Through life's interminable ache  

He had no courage to undertake  

His duty. Slave to fear and grief,  

He held ideas beyond belief,  

And longed to tread near madness' brink.  

Those he loved, with evil's sting  

He wounded worse than any foe;  

Yet his worst foe was himself, even so.  

He sang the Self, would not submit,  

Locked in his fever-dreams of wit.  

All his sentimentalities  

Were void, his fears and agonies  

Meant nothing, drew no human eyes.  

His sorrows petty, cheap; his cries  

Bitterer than hate, yet his sick soul  

Could not express the aching whole.  

Thus he was wretched, thus distressed,  

Yet could weep when his heart was pressed...  

None knew he was mad. Let no sane mind  

Pollute his grave, fit for the kind  

Of traitors and of harlots. Let  

The drunkard and the reprobate  

Pass by, but quickly, lest they learn.  

Perhaps joy is but a shadow's turn.  

Every weak and hateful mind  

That with its rot infects mankind  

Will here find its conscious lord,  

Conscious because he could afford  

To see in them their madness plain,  

But would not cure it. Let those who can  

Weep here; when wind sweeps the dead leaves,  

Let rottenness work what it achieves  

In being ignored. His brothers laid  

Under grass, let none invade  

Even in thought, with God's vain name.  

Let him lie quiet, free from shame  

Of human eyes and mouths, and all  

That linked him to their earthly thrall.  

He was God's creature, who to live  

Sinned, and the greater sin did give:  

He thought.

Fernando Pessoa. TOBACCO SHOP

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