Alberto Caeiro 1. I never kept sheep, But it’s as if I had. My soul is like a shepherd, It knows the wind and the sun And walks hand in hand with the Seasons, Following and looking. All the peace of peopleless Nature Comes to sit by my side. But I feel as sad as a sunset is To our imagination, When we see it fading in the distance And feel the night enter Like a butterfly through the open window. But my sadness is soothing Because it’s natural and right And is what should be there in the soul When it already thinks it exists And our hands pick flowers without the soul even noticing. With a clanking of sheep bells Beyond the bend in the road, My thoughts are contented. I’m only sorry to know they’re contented, Because if I didn’t know that, Instead of being contented and sad, They would be joyful and contented. Thinking is as unpleasant as walking in the rain When the wind builds and makes the rain seem heavier. I have no ambitions or desires. Being a poet is not my ambition. It’s my way of being alone. And if sometimes I want, In my imagination, to be a little lamb (Or to be the whole flock And wander over the entire hillside And be many happy things at the same time), It’s only because I feel what I write at sunset, Or when a cloud passes a hand over the light And a silence runs away through the grass. When I sit down to write verses Or, when, walking the paths or trails, I write verses on a piece of paper in my mind, I feel a shepherd’s crook in my hand And I see another me On top of a hill, Looking down at my flock and seeing my ideas, Or looking down at my ideas and seeing my flock, And smiling vaguely like someone who hasn’t understood what was said But pretends that he has. I salute all those who’ll read me, Taking off my broad-brimmed hat to them When they see me at my door As their carriage appears over the hill. I salute them and wish them sun, And rain, when rain is needed, And for their houses to have, Next to an open window, A favorite chair Where they sit, reading my verses. And that when they read my verses they will think That I am some natural thing— For example, the ancient tree In whose shade, when they were children, They would flop down, weary with playing, And wipe the sweat from their hot brow With the sleeve of their striped smock.