This By Fernando Pessoa

They say I lie or feign

In all I write. Not true.

It’s simply that I feel

Via the imagination.

The heart I never use.

All I dream or live,

Whatever fails or dies,

Is no more than a covering

Over some other thing

Where true beauty lies.

That’s why I base my writings

On things that are remote

Freed from my reality,

Serious about what isn’t.

Feel? That’s up to the reader!

From “Fernando Pessoa & Co.,” edited and translated by Richard Zenith (Grove Press: 290 pp., $25)