They are assembled, astounded, bewildered,
round him who, like a sage centered at last,
withdraws from those to whom he once belonged
and flows beyond them as some foreigner.
The former solitude comes over him
which raised him to perform his profound acts;
again he’ll wander in the olive grove,
and those who love him will now run from him.

He summons them to the final meal
and (as a shot shoos birds from sheaves)
he shoos their hands from bread
with his word: they flutter up to him;
they flap about the table anxiously
searching for some way out. But he,
like an evening hour, is everywhere.