With heavy groans did I approach my friends,Heavy as though the mountains I would move.The flagon they were murdering; they pouredInto the cup, wild-eyed, the grape’s red blood.No, they killed not, they breathed new life therein.Then, too, in fiery rapture, burned my veins,But soon the fumes had fled. In vain, in vain!Ye cannot fill the […]

The Autumn promised, and he keepsHis word unto the meadow-rose.The pure, bright lightnings herald Spring,Serene and glad the fresh earth shows.The rain has quenched her children’s thirst,Her cheeks, but now so cold and dry,Are soft and fair, a laughing face;With clouds of purple shines the sky,Though filled with light, yet veiled with haze.Hark! hark! the […]

Long in the lap of childhood didst thou sleep,Think how thy youth like chaff did disappear;Shall life’s sweet Spring forever last? Look up,Old age approaches ominously near.Oh shake thou off the world, even as the birdShakes off the midnight dew that clogged his wings.Soar upward, seek redemption from thy guiltAnd from the earthly dross that […]

But yesterday the earth drank like a childWith eager thirst the autumn rain.Or like a wistful bride who waits the hourOf love’s mysterious bliss and pain.And now the Spring is here with yearning eyes;Midst shimmering golden flower-beds,On meadows carpeted with varied hues,In richest raiment clad, she treads.She weaves a tapestry of bloom o’er all,And myriad […]

Where is the man who has been tried and found strong and sound?Where is the friend of reason and of knowledge?I see only sceptics and weaklings.I see only prisoners in the durance of the senses,And every fool and every spendthriftThinks himself as great a master as Aristotle.Think’st thou that they have written poems?Call’st thou that […]

My thoughts impelled me to the resting-placeWhere sleep my parents, many a friend and brother.I asked them (no one heard and none replied):“Do ye forsake me, too, oh father, mother?”Then from the grave, without a tongue, these cried,And showed my own place waiting by their side.

I. The shadow of the houses leave behind,In the cool boscage of the grove reclined,The wine of friendship from love’s goblet drink,And entertain with cheerful speech the mind. Drink, friend! behold, the dreary winter’s gone,The mantle of old age has time withdrawn.The sunbeam glitters in the morning dew,O’er hill and vale youth’s bloom is surging […]

I. My two-score years and ten are over,Never again shall youth be mine.The years are ready-winged for flying,What crav’st thou still of feast and wine?Wilt thou still court man’s acclamation,Forgetting what the Lord hath said?And forfeiting thy weal eternal,By thine own guilty heart misled?Shalt thou have never done with folly,Still fresh and new must it […]

O city of the world, with sacred splendor blest,My spirit yearns to thee from out the far-off West,A stream of love wells forth when I recall thy day,Now is thy temple waste, thy glory passed away.Had I an eagle’s wings, straight would I fly to thee,Moisten thy holy dust with wet cheeks streaming free.Oh, how […]

Since thou and I have proven many a timeThat all our hope betrays us and deceives,To that consummate good which never grievesUplift thy heart, towards a happier clime.This life is like a field of flowering thyme,Amidst the herbs and grass the serpent lives;If aught unto the sight brief pleasure gives,‘T is but to snare the […]

I. DONNA CLARA. (From the German of Heine) In the evening through her gardenWanders the Alcalde’s daughter,Festal sounds of drum and trumpetRing out hither from the Castle. “I am weary of the dances,Honeyed words of adulationFrom the knights who still compare meTo the sun with dainty phrases. “Yes, of all things I am weary,Since I […]

I. Now the dreary winter’s over,Fled with him are grief and pain,When the trees their bloom recover,Then the soul is born again.Spikenard blossoms shaking,Perfume all the air,And in bud and flower breaking,Stands my garden fair.While with swelling gladness blest,Heaves my friend’s rejoicing breast.Oh, come home, lost friend of mine,Scared from out my tent and land.Drink […]

I. The long-closed door, oh open it again, send me back once more my fawn that had fled. On the day of our reunion, thou shalt rest by my side, there wilt thou shed over me the streams of thy delicious perfume. Oh beautiful bride, what is the form of thy friend, that thou say […]

Yon nightingale who mourns so plaintivelyPerchance his fledglings or his darling mate,Fills sky and earth with sweetness, warbling late,Prophetic notes of melting melody.All night, he, as it were, companions me,Reminding me of my so cruel fate,Mourning no other grief save mine own state,Who knew not Death reigned o’er divinity.How easy ‘t is to dupe the […]

The noble Column, the green Laurel-treeAre fall’n, that shaded once my weary mind.Now I have lost what I shall never find,From North to South, from Red to Indian Sea.My double treasure Death has filched from me,Which made me proud and happy midst my kind.Nor may all empires of the world combined,Nor Orient gems, nor gold […]

The God of Love and I in wonder stared,(Ne’er having gazed on miracles ere now,)Upon my lady’s smiling lips and brow,Who only with herself may be compared.Neath the calm beauty of her forehead bared,Those twin stars of my love did burn and flow,No lesser lamps again the path might showTo the proud lover who by […]

I saw on earth angelic graces beam,Celestial beauty in our world below,Whose mere remembrance thrills with grief and woe;All I see now seems shadow, smoke and dream.I saw in those twin-lights the tear-drops gleam,Those lights that made the sun with envy glow,And from those lips such sighs and words did flow,As made revolve the hills, […]

Sennuccio, I would have thee know the shameThat’s dealt to me, and what a life is mine.Even as of yore, I struggle, burn and pine.Laura transports me, I am still the same.All meekness here, all pride she there became,Now harsh, now kind, now cruel, now benign;Here honor clothed her, there a grace divine;Now gentle, now […]

MUSE.Give me a kiss, my poet, take thy lyre;The buds are bursting on the wild sweet-briar.To-night the Spring is born–the breeze takes fire.Expectant of the dawn behold the thrush,Perched on the fresh branch of the first green bush;Give me a kiss, my poet, take thy lyre. POET.How black it looks within the vale!I thought a […]

I never see, after nocturnal rain,The wandering stars move through the air serene,And flame forth ‘twixt the dew-fall and the rime,But I behold her radiant eyes whereinMy weary spirit findeth rest from pain;As dimmed by her rich veil, I saw her the first time;The very heaven beamed with the light sublimeOf their celestial beauty; dewy-wetStill […]