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The Essential Goethe

PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS

Selected Poems

    WELCOME AND FAREWELL
      (1771; 1789)

    My heart beat fast, a horse! away!
    Quicker than thought I am astride,
    Earth now lulled by end of day,
    Night hovering on the mountainside.
    A robe of mist around him flung,
    The oak a towering giant stood,
    A hundred eyes of jet had sprung
    From darkness in the bushy wood.

    Atop a hill of cloud the moon
    Shed piteous glimmers through the mist,
    Softly the wind took flight, and soon
    With horrible wings around me hissed.
    Night made a thousand ghouls respire,
    Of what I felt, a thousandth part —
    My mind, what a consuming fire!
    What a glow was in my heart!

    You I saw, your look replied,
    Your sweet felicity, my own,
    My heart was with you, at your side,
    I breathed for you, for you alone.
    A blush was there, as if your face
    A rosy hue of Spring had caught,
    For me — ye gods! — this tenderness!
    I hoped, and I deserved it not.

    Yet soon the morning sun was there,
    My heart, ah, shrank as leave I took:
    How rapturous your kisses were,
    What anguish then was in your look!
    I left, you stood with downcast eyes,
    In tears you saw me riding off:
    Yet, to be loved, what happiness!
    What happiness, ye gods, to love!


    ROSEBUD IN THE HEATHER
      (1771)

    Urchin saw a rose — a dear
    Rosebud in the heather.
    Fresh as dawn and morning-clear;
    Ran up quick and stooped to peer,
    Took his fill of pleasure,
    Rosebud, rosebud, rosebud red,
    Rosebud in the heather.

    Urchin blurts: "I'll pick you, though,
    Rosebud in the heather!"
    Rosebud: "Then I'll stick you so
    That there's no forgetting, no!
    I'll not stand it, ever!"
    Rosebud, rosebud, rosebud red,
    Rosebud in the heather.

    But the wild young fellow's torn
    Rosebud from the heather.
    Rose, she pricks him with her thorn;
    Should she plead, or cry forlorn?
    Makes no difference whether.
    Rosebud, rosebud, rosebud red,
    Rosebud in the heather.


    PROMETHEUS
      (1773)

    Cover your heaven, Zeus,
    With cloudy vapors
    And like a boy
    Beheading thistles

    Practice on oaks and mountain peaks —
    Still you must leave
    My earth intact
    And my small hovel, which you did not build,
    And this my hearth
    Whose glowing heat
    You envy me.

    I know of nothing more wretched
    Under the sun than you gods!
    Meagerly you nourish
    Your majesty
    On dues of sacrifice
    And breath of prayer
    And would suffer want
    But for children and beggars,
    Poor hopeful fools.

    Once too, a child,
    Not knowing where to turn,
    I raised bewildered eyes
    Up to the sun, as if above there were
    An ear to hear my complaint,
    A heart like mine
    To take pity on the oppressed.

    Who helped me
    Against the Titans' arrogance?
    Who rescued me from death,
    From slavery?
    Did not my holy and glowing heart,
    Unaided, accomplish all?
    And did it not, young and good,
    Cheated, glow thankfulness
    For its safety to him, to the sleeper above?

    I pay homage to you? For what?
    Have you ever relieved
    The burdened man's anguish?
    Have you ever assuaged
    The frightened man's tears?
    Was it not omnipotent Time
    That forged me into manhood,
    And eternal Fate,
    My masters and yours?

    Or did you think perhaps
    That I should hate this life,
    Flee into deserts
    Because not all
    The blossoms of dream grew ripe?

    Here I sit, forming men
    In my image,
    A race to resemble me:
    To suffer, to weep,
    To enjoy, to be glad —
    And never to heed you,
    Like me!


    IN COURT
    (c. 1774–75)

    Who gave it me, I shall not tell,
    The child I've got in me;
    Call me a whore, if you like, and spit:
    I'm an honest woman, see?

    He's good and kind, I'll not say who,
    My sweetheart that I wed,
    A chain of gold on his neck he wears
    And a straw hat on his head.

    Chuckle and scorn to your heart's content,
    I'll take the scorn from you;
    I know him well, he knows me well,
    God knows about us, too.

    Lay off me, folks, you, reverend,
    You, officer of the laws!
    It is my child, it stays my child,
    And it's no concern of yours.


    ON THE LAKE
      (1775)

    And fresh nourishment, new blood
    I suck from a world so free;
    Nature, how gracious and how good,
    Her breast she gives to me.
    The ripples buoying up our boat
    Keep rhythm to the oars,
    And mountains up to heaven float
    In cloud to meet our course.

    Eyes, my eyes, why abject now?
    Golden dreams, are you returning?
    Dream, though gold, away with you:
    Life is here and loving too.

    Over the ripples twinkling
    Star on hovering star,
    Soft mists drink the circled
    Towering world afar;
    Dawn wind fans the shaded
    Inlet with its wing,
    And in the water mirrored
    The fruit is ripening.


    AUTUMN FEELING
      (1775)

    More fatly greening climb
    The trellis, you, vine leaf
    Up to my window!
    Gush, denser, berries
    Twin, and ripen
    Shining fuller, faster!
    Last gaze of sun
    Broods you, maternal;
    Of tender sky the fruiting
    Fullness wafts around you;
    Cooled you are, by the moon

    Magic, a friendly breath,
    And from these eyes,
    Of ever quickening Love, ah,
    Upon you falls a dew, the tumid
    Brimming tears.


    WANDERER'S NIGHT SONG
      (1776)

    Thou that from the heavens art,
       Every pain and sorrow stillest,
    And the doubly wretched heart
       Doubly with refreshment fillest,
    I am weary with contending!
       Why this rapture and unrest?
    Peace descending
       Come, ah, come into my breast!


    ANOTHER NIGHT SONG
      (1780)

    O'er all the hill-tops
      Is quiet now,
    In all the tree-tops
      Hearest thou
    Hardly a breath;
      The birds are asleep in the trees:
      Wait, soon like these
      Thou, too, shalt rest.
    (Longfellow)

    Over mountains yonder,
      A stillness;
    Scarce any breath, you wonder,
      Touches
    The tops of all the trees.
      No forest birds now sing;
    A moment, waiting —
      Then take, you too, your ease.
    (CM)


    TO CHARLOTTE VON STEIN
      (1776)

    Why confer on us the piercing vision:
    All tomorrow vivid in our gaze?
    Not a chance to build on love's illusion?
    Not a glimmer of idyllic days?
    Why confer on us, O fate, the feeling
    Each can plumb the other's very heart?
    Always, though in storms of passion reeling,
    See precisely what a course we chart?

    Look at all those many thousands drudging
    (Knowing even their own nature less
    Than we know each other), thousands trudging,
    In the dark about their own distress;
    Drunk on exultation, when they're treated
    Suddenly to joy's magenta dawn.
    Only we unlucky lovers, cheated
    Of all mutual comfort, have forgone
    This: to be in love, not understanding;
    This: to see the other as he's not;
    Off in gaudy dreams go hand-in-handing,
    In appalling dreams turn cold and hot.

    Happy man, a fleeting dream engages!
    Happy man, no premonitions numb!
    We however — ! All our looks and touches
    Reaffirm our fear of days to come.
    Tell me, what's our destiny preparing?
    Tell me, how we're bound in such a knot?
    From an old existence we were sharing?
    You're the wife, the sister I forgot?

    Knew me then completely, every feature,
    How each nerve responded and rang true;
    Read me in a single glance — a nature
    Others search bewildered for a clue.
    To that heated blood, a cool transfusion;
    To that crazy runaway, a rein;
    In your clasp, what Edens of seclusion
    Nursed to health that fellow, heart and brain.
    Held him tightly, lightly, as enchanted;
    Spirited the round of days away.
    Where's a joy like this? — you'd think transplanted
    At your feet the flushing lover lay;
    Lay and felt his heart, against you, lighten;
    Felt your eye approving; but he's good!
    Felt his murky senses clear and brighten;
    On his raging blood, a quietude.

    Now, of all that was, about him hovers
    Just a haze of memory, hardly there.
    Still the ancient truth avails: we're lovers —
    Though our new condition's a despair.
    Only half a mind for earth. Around us
    Twilight thickens on the brightest day.
    Yet we're still in luck: the fates that hound us
    Couldn't wish our love away.


      TO THE MOON
    (1777; THIS SECOND VERSION PUBLISHED 1789)

    Flooding with a brilliant mist
    Valley, bush and tree,
    You release me. Oh for once
    Heart and soul I'm free!

    Easy on the region round
    Goes your wider gaze,
    Like a friend's indulgent eye
    Measuring my days.

    Every echo from the past,
    Glum or gaudy mood,
    Haunts me — weighing bliss and pain
    In the solitude.

    River, flow and flow away;
    Pleasure's dead to me:
    Gone the laughing kisses, gone
    Lips and loyalty.

    All in my possession once!
    Such a treasure yet
    Any man would pitch in pain
    Rather than forget.

    Water, rush along the pass,
    Never lag at ease;
    Rush, and rustle to my song
    Changing melodies.

    How in dark December you
    Roll amok in flood;
    Curling, in the gala May,
    Under branch and bud.

    Happy man, that rancor-free
    Shows the world his door;
    One companion by — and both
    In a glow before

    Something never guessed by men
    Or rejected quite:
    Which, in mazes of the breast,
    Wanders in the night.


    A WINTER JOURNEY IN THE HARZ
      (1777)

    As the buzzard aloft
    On heavy daybreak cloud
    With easy pinion rests
    Searching for prey,
    May my song hover.

      For a god has
    Duly to each
    His path prefixed,
    And the fortunate man
    Runs fast and joyfully
    To his journey's end;
    But he whose heart
    Misfortune constricted
    Struggles in vain
    To break from the bonds
    Of the brazen thread
    Which the shears, so bitter still,
    Cut once alone.

      Into grisly thickets
    The rough beasts run,
    And with the sparrows
    The rich long since have
    Sunk in their swamps.

      Easy it is to follow that car
    Which Fortune steers,
    Like the leisurely troop that rides
    The fine highroads
    Behind the array of the Prince.

      But who is it stands aloof?
    His path is lost in the brake,
    Behind him the shrubs
    Close and he's gone,
    Grass grows straight again,
    The emptiness swallows him.

      O who shall heal his agony then
    In whom each balm turned poison,
    Who drank hatred of man
    From the very fullness of love?
    First held now holding in contempt.
    In secret he consumes
    His own particular good
    In selfhood unsated.

      If in your book of songs
    Father of love, there sounds
    One note his ear can hear,
    Refresh with it then his heart!
    Open his clouded gaze
    To the thousand fountainheads
    About him as he thirsts
    In the desert!

      You who give joys that are manifold,
    To each his overflowing share,
    Bless the companions that hunt
    On the spoor of the beasts
    With young exuberance
    Of glad desire to kill,
    Tardy avengers of outrage
    For so long repelled in vain
    By the cudgeling countryman.

      But hide the solitary man
    In your sheer gold cloud!
    Till roses flower again
    Surround with winter-green
    The moistened hair,
    O love, of your poet!

      With your lantern glowing
    You light his way
    Over the fords by night,
    On impassable tracks
    Through the void countryside;
    With daybreak thousand-hued
    Into his heart you laugh;
    With the mordant storm
    You bear him aloft;
    Winter streams plunge from the crag
    Into his songs,
    And his altar of sweetest thanks
    Is the snow-hung brow
    Of the terrible peak
    People in their imaginings crowned
    With spirit dances.

      You stand with heart unplumbed
    Mysteriously revealed
    Above the marveling world
    And you look from clouds
    On the kingdoms and magnificence
    Which from your brothers' veins beside you
    With streams you water.


    SONG OF THE SPIR ITS OVER THE WATERS
      (1779)

    The soul of man,
    It is like water:
    It comes from heaven,
    It mounts to heaven,
    And earthward again
    Descends
    Eternally changing.

    If the pure jet
    Streams from the high
    Vertical rockface,
    A powdering spray,
    A wave of cloud
    Splashes the smooth rock
    And gathered lightly
    Like a veil it rolls
    Murmuring onward
    To depths yonder.

    If cliffs loom up
    To stem its fall,
    It foams petulant
    Step by step
    To the abyss.

    Along a level bed
    Through the glen it slips,
    In the lake unruffled
    All the clustering stars
    Turn their gaze.

    Wind woos
    The wave like a lover,
    Wind churns from the ground up
    Foaming billows.

    Soul of man,
    How like the water you are!
    Fate of man,
    How like the wind.


    THE FISHER MAN
      (END OF 1770S)

    The water washed, the water rose;
    A fellow fishing sat
    And watched his bobbin coolly drift,
    His blood was cool as that.
    A while he sits, a while he harks
    — Like silk the ripples tear,
    And up in swirls of foam arose
    A girl with dripping hair.

    She sang to him, she spoke to him:
    "Cajole my minnows so
    With lore of men, with lure of men,
    To death's unholy glow?
    If you could know my silver kin,
    What cozy hours they passed,
    You'd settle under, clothes and all
    — A happy life at last.

    "The sun, it likes to bathe and bathe;
    The moon — now doesn't she?
    And don't they both, to breathe the wave,
    Look up more brilliantly?
    You're not allured by lakes of sky,
    More glorious glossy blue?
    Not by your very face transformed
    In this eternal dew? "

    The water washed, the water rose;
    It lapped his naked toe.
    As longing for the one he loved
    He yearned to sink below.
    She spoke to him, she sang to him;
    The fellow, done for then,
    Half yielded too as half she drew,
    Was never seen again.


    THE GODLIKE
      (EARLY 1780S)

    Noble let man be,
    Helpful and good;
    For that alone
    Distinguishes him
    From all beings
    That we know.

    Hail to the unknown,
    Loftier beings
    Our minds prefigure!
    Let man be like them;
    His example teach us
    To believe those.

    For unfeeling,
    Numb, is nature;
    The sun shines
    Upon bad and good,
    And to the criminal
    As to the best
    The moon and the stars lend light.

    Wind and rivers,
    Thunder and hail
    Rush on their way
    And as they race
    Headlong, take hold
    One on the other.

    So, too, chance
    Gropes through the crowd,
    And quickly snatches
    The boy's curled innocence,
    Quickly also
    The guilty baldpate.

    Following great, bronzen,
    Ageless laws
    All of us must
    Fulfill the circles
    Of our existence.

    Yet man alone can
    Achieve the impossible:
    He distinguishes,
    Chooses and judges;
    He can give lasting
    Life to the moment.

    He alone should
    Reward the good,
    Punish the wicked,
    Heal and save,
    All erring and wandering
    Usefully gather.

    And we honor
    Them, the immortals,
    As though they were men,
    Achieving in great ways
    What the best in little
    Achieves or longs to.

    Let noble man
    Be helpful and good.
    Create unwearied
    The useful, the just:
    Be to us a pattern
    Of those prefigured beings.

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Excerpted from The Essential Goethe by Johann Wolfgang von GOETHE, Matthew Bell. Copyright © 2016 Princeton University Press. Excerpted by permission of PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS.
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