At the bridge I stood

lately in the brown night.

From afar came a song:

as a golden drop it welled

over the quivering surface.

Gondolas, lights, and music -

drunken it swam out into the twilight.

My soul, a stringed instrument,

sang to itself, invisibly touched,

a secret gondola song,

quivering with iridescent happiness.

- Did anyone listen to it?

Friedrich Nietzsche