[Male lead — intimate, clear melodic singing] For ten long years I lived above the world, Where morning touched the mountains, Where silence had no end. O golden sun, What would your radiance be Without the eyes That wait for you? I have gathered too much light. My heart has grown too full. Now I must descend, Now I must return. [Soft female humming — wordless, distant] [Male lead — restrained, questioning] The heavens have fallen silent. The ancient answers fade. We search among the ruins For promises once made. Who shall give us meaning? Who shall name the good? Who shall bear the freedom We have never understood? [Male lead — melodic refrain] No voice above the clouds, No hand to write my fate. The world is still before me. The hour is not too late. [Male lead — tender, searching] Suppose this life returns, Again, again, again. The laughter of the morning, The tenderness, the pain. Every road I wandered, Every love I could not keep, Every lonely winter, Every night without sleep. Would I turn away? Would I beg to be released? [Female harmonies — soft, luminous] Again, again, The river meets the sea. Again, again, The moment comes to be. [Male lead — rising melodic intensity] If all must come again, Let everything return. The joy, the loss, the longing, The fire through which I burn. [Male lead — warm, luminous, quietly resolute] I ask no other lifetime. I seek no distant shore. The earth beneath my footsteps Is all I need, no more. I will not curse the darkness. I will not flee the rain. For everything that wounded me Has also shaped my name. [Male lead with interwoven female harmonies] Yes, to the sorrow. Yes, to the light. Yes, to the fleeting beauty Of this unfinished life. [Female voices — sustained wordless harmonies] [Male lead — intimate final phrase] Thus spoke Zarathustra. Yes, to life. [Harpsichord and strings dissolve into silence]
