The Fool (Translation) Poem by Erhard Hans Josef Lang

At the end of this my journeying on earth
I'll be taking down the mask, thus:
At the end of my journeying,
I'll hurl it now against the smilers of the herd.

Now has come the end of the laughter,
and of the fool's farce.
Since the end of the laughter will have come,
it were a moment of accusation.

But with such a herd of sheep
I shall not even take to flogging any.
For having a herd of sheep flogged
pity only were in place.

- You're walking about in a game of hide & seek
with the people you don't know.
Likewise you're at playing hide & seek with your own heart.

You are displaying shining name-plates
walking about with your feathers bristling,
each and every name-plate but has a stained backside.

You are using false weighing scales,
false being also the weights.
Making use of weighing scales thus false,
everything valuable becomes worthless.

He whose tummy always is filled
is praised as the wise.
If only the tummy was full
it was alright for the head to be empty.

Also, on each and every one of you
I spotted a set of a fool's tinkling bells.
And, each and every one of you
had them also clinking on going about.

by Finnish poet Uuno Kailas (1901-1933)
transl. by Erhard Lang