Poems of St. John of the Cross

1. One dark night,

fired with love's urgent longings

--ah, the sheer grace!---

I went out unseen,

my house being now all stilled.

2. In darkness, and secure,

by the secret ladder, disguised,

--ah, the sheer grace!--

in darkness and concealment,

my house being now all stilled.

3. On that glad night,

in secret, for no one saw me,

nor did I look at anything,

with no other light or guide

than the one that burned in my heart.

4. This guided me

more surely than the light of noon

to where he was awaiting me

--him I knew so well--

there in a place where no one appeared.

5. O guiding night!

O night more lovely than the dawn!

O night that has united

the Lover with his beloved,

transforming the beloved in her Lover.

6. Upon my flowering breast

which I kept wholly for him alone,

there he lay sleeping,

and I caressing him

there in a breeze from the fanning cedars.

7. When the breeze blew from the turret,

as I parted his hair,

it wounded my neck

with its gentle hand,

suspending all my senses.

8. I abandoned and forgot myself,

laying my face on my Beloved;

all things ceased; I went out from myself,

leaving my cares

forgotten among the lilies.

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