If you were a child in a happy flock
How could you possibly understand
How it was that I grew to hate the day,
A constant hostile danger,
And felt abandoned: a stranger.

Only perhaps on some night in May,
With the scents of Spring, would I be
Secretly content.

By day imprisoned by the tight ring
Of cowardly duty, devotedly performed,
Escaping in the evenings, not hearing
The sound of a tiny window opening
And a butterfly taking my longing
On a silent voyage to the stars to ask:
Where is my home?

Rainer Maria Rilke