Hymns by Hölderlin: At the Source of the Danube

For, as if exalted by the perfectly tuned, the organ

In the holy room,

Swells immaculate, from inexhaustible pipes,

And begins the prelude of the morning,

Awakening, far and wide, hall through echoing hall, 

The freshened now, the current flow of melody,

As far as the cold shadow of house

Suffused everywhere with rapture,

But it has awoke, now, climbing over them,

The festival sun, which comes to answer the choir

Of the community: so came

The word from the East to us,

And at Parnassus Rock and at Cithaeron I hear,

O Asia, your echo, and it fractures

At the Capitol and dropping down from the Alps

Comes a stranger, her

To us, the awakener,

The human-forming voice.

The spirit seized all the aggrieved

In astonishment, and night

Was over the eyes of the best.

For many are able

And the force of fire and tide and promontory

Defeat the people too with art

And regard, not high-mindedness, the sword,

Though the strong

Stand despondent before the divine,

And nearly the same as an animal; that,

Which sweet youth drives,

Tears restlessly over the mountain

And feels its own strength

In the heat of day. If but

Guided along, with a cooler ray,

In the play of air and sacred light,  

The spirit of joy will come

To the overjoyed earth, before it succumbs,

Unaccustomed to the most beautiful, and sleeping

A heedful sleep, before the stars draw near. So too do we. For

Some had lost their sight before the gifts divinely sent,

They came, gently, from Ionia, and

Arabia as well, and we were happy

With the costly lessons and the delicate songs

The soul had never slipped off to oblivion,

For some were awake, watching. And often they walked

Content among you, citizens of superb cities,

When playing war, where the otherwise indiscernible hero

Sat in secret with poets, who the wrestlers saw and smiled

Praising, the most highly praised, the most idle children.

A ceaseless love was and is.

And separated cleanly, so therefore we

Think we’re still together, across the Isthmus of Corinth,

With you happy ones at Cepheus, and Taygetus,

The Caucasus and its fractioned valleys, we think we’re you too,

As old as you are, you paradises there,

And your patriarchs and your prophets,

O Asia, awesome and hard, O mother!

The fearless emblem of the world,

With heaven on her shoulders and all karma,

Deep rooted in mountains for days,

At first she understood,

To talk alone

To God. What’s missing now. But if you,

That is to say,

You old ones, did not say, that’s why

We can name you: we name, compelled by heaven,

Nature! Our verse, and new, divine things are born

Rising out from the fountain.

Though we almost flee, like an orphan;

To be free of the mere usual care again;

But youth can remember a childhood

Where something in the house was not foreign.

You have lived three times, just like

The first sons of heaven.

And it was not in vain that we became

The loyalty given to your soul.

But you will neither save us, nor yourself,

And at the holy shrines, those weapons of words

Just separate you from the hapless, us,

The sons of your fate, left behind,

Your good spirits lift, when the Holy Cloud

Floats over you, and there we are too,

Often astonished, and unable to construe.

But you season us with nectar, of the messenger,

And so we crow, or it tends to afflict us

With a brooding, for if you love someone too much,

You will not rest until it becomes your own.

So, you with compassion, surround me in light,

That I may last, because there is still much to sing,

Though that’s what now ends, in ecstatic lament,

Like a legend made of love,

The song to me, and so he turns,

Myself, from living red to deathly pale,

Never having been there at all. So it all goes.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Am Quell der Donau

Denn, wie wenn hoch von der herrlichgestimmten, der Orgel

Im heiligen Saal,

Reinquillend aus den unerschöpflichen Röhren,

Das Vorspiel, weckend, des Morgens beginnt

Und weitumher, von Halle zu Halle,

Der erfrischende nun, der melodische Strom rinnt,

Bis in den kalten Schatten das Haus

Von Begeisterungen erfüllt,

Nun aber erwacht ist, nun, aufsteigend ihr,

Der Sonne des Fests, antwortet

Der Chor der Gemeinde: so kam

Das Wort aus Osten zu uns,

Und an Parnassos Felsen und am Kithäron hör ich,

O Asia, das Echo von dir und es bricht sich

Am Kapitol und jählings herab von den Alpen

Kommt eine Fremdlingin sie

Zu uns, die Erweckerin,

Die menschenbildende Stimme.

Da faßt' ein Staunen die Seele

Der Getroffenen all und Nacht

War über den Augen der Besten.

Denn vieles vermag

Und die Flut und den Fels und Feuersgewalt auch

Bezwinget mit Kunst der Mensch

Und achtet, der Hochgesinnte, das Schwert

Nicht, aber es steht

Vor Göttlichem der Starke niedergeschlagen,

Und gleichet dem Wild fast; das,

Von süßer Jugend getrieben,

Schweift rastlos über die Berg

Und fühlet die eigene Kraft

In der Mittagshitze. Wenn aber

Herabgeführt, in spielenden Lüften,

Das heilige Licht, und mit dem kühleren Strahl

Der freudige Geist kommt zu

Der seligen Erde, dann erliegt es, ungewohnt

Des Schönsten, und schlummert wachenden Schlaf,

Noch ehe Gestirn naht. So auch wir. Denn manchen erlosch

Das Augenlicht schon vor den göttlichgesendeten Gaben,

Den freundlichen, die aus Ionien uns,

Auch aus Arabia kamen, und froh ward

Der teuern Lehr und auch der holden Gesänge

Die Seele jener Entschlafenen nie,

Doch einige wachten. Und sie wandelten oft

Zufrieden unter euch, ihr Bürger schöner Städte,

Beim Kampfspiel, wo sonst unsichtbar der Heros

Geheim bei Dichtern saß, die Ringer schaut' und lächelnd

Pries, der gepriesene, die müßigernsten Kinder.

Ein unaufhörlich Lieben wars und ists.

Und wohlgeschieden, aber darum denken

Wir aneinander doch, ihr Fröhlichen am Isthmos,

Und am Cephiß und am Taygetos,

Auch eurer denken wir, ihr Tale des Kaukasos,

So alt ihr seid, ihr Paradiese dort,

Und deiner Patriarchen und deiner Propheten,

O Asia, deiner Starken, o Mutter!

Die furchtlos vor den Zeichen der Welt,

Und den Himmel auf Schultern und alles Schicksal,

Taglang auf Bergen gewurzelt,

Zuerst es verstanden,

Allein zu reden

Zu Gott. Die ruhn nun. Aber wenn ihr,

Und dies ist zu sagen,

Ihr Alten all, nicht sagtet, woher

Wir nennen dich: heiliggenötiget, nennen,

Natur! dich wir, und neu, wie dem Bad entsteigt

Dir alles Göttlichgeborne.

Zwar gehn wir fast, wie die Waisen;

Wohl ists, wie sonst, nur jene Pflege nicht wieder;

Doch Jünglinge, der Kindheit gedenk,

Im Hause sind auch diese nicht fremde.

Sie leben dreifach, eben wie auch

Die ersten Söhne des Himmels.

Und nicht umsonst ward uns

In die Seele die Treue gegeben.

Nicht uns, auch Eures bewahrt sie,

Und bei den Heiligtümern, den Waffen des Worts,

Die scheidend ihr den Ungeschickteren uns,

Ihr Schicksalssöhne, zurückgelassen,

Ihr guten Geister, da seid ihr auch,

Oftmals, wenn einen dann die heilige Wolk umschwebt,

Da staunen wir und wissens nicht zu deuten.

Ihr aber würzt mit Nektar uns den Othem

Und dann frohlocken wir oft oder es befällt uns

Ein Sinnen, wenn ihr aber einen zu sehr liebt,

Er ruht nicht, bis er euer einer geworden.

Darum, ihr Gütigen! umgebet mich leicht,

Damit ich bleiben möge, denn noch ist manches zu singen,

Jetzt aber endiget, seligweinend,

Wie eine Sage der Liebe,

Mir der Gesang, und so auch ist er

Mir, mit Erröten, Erblassen,

Von Anfang her gegangen. Doch Alles geht so.

Parental Neglect

I teach my children how to say nothing
     with as many words as possible,
How love means never having to fix anything
     as long as I'm crucified trying,

That dishes can be cleaned, dinners can be made,
     laundry can exist in folded piles.
And, no matter what chore I'm doing,
     I must stop to allow their cherished

Noodlings of youthful ennui to be
     more urgent, more life affirming
Than those of the time I come from,
     which only exist now in shameless echo.

How I wish even that, for it turns out the things
     that were hardest to learn must be wrong,
And the rules that saved me from ruin are fit
     for museums, like live burials and Catherine wheels.

Adults should be seen and not heard, they say,
     like the statuesque heroes of yesterday,
And when their questions are asked about me,
     I keep it as brief as they can stand.

I'm waiting for them to leave home
     so I can miss them
As they wait for me to stop doing, doing for everyone else
     and have something at last for myself.

Celebration of Failure

Sometimes the advice from on high
Turned out to be good.
Other times it would have been better
If we only heard the bats.

How can we live like this, half-right?
Is our interacting so fragile
We need to make being wrong
Wrong?

Surfliner Epiphany

The light has no place in this terminal of dark,
It's swallowed like a balloon of Cuba Blue.
Information free of context is mere data,
A sea of noise that makes of milky nebulae
Ejaculations of some lifeless gas.
How we want that sound to think for us,
To take our minds and hands away
To dramatized miraclities, full of virtual
Philosophies and death in 3D,
Finally meaningless like everything else.

The lime auras and the instant phospheresences of green,
Miracles pulled from the same black hat,
Do their act inside a separate head.
Fantasies shared are no longer fantasy,
But reality experienced as a dream
Can only stay a dream for others, a step away
From the never solid, never certain world,
Its ever-fearful dark that always beckons,
That always questions what we believe --

We just can't allow in a traveler without a stamp;
There are too many orphans waiting on the platform
Hoping for an open door, a kindly conductor,
To let them pass through --

The way is always going, as if it slips away
From reaching fingers, not the play of
Circling flies, without a center there,
When the world before the eye
Forever makes new homes as
Doors open, winds blow, forms turn,
Families dissolve, and the friends that are
Strangers start taking pictures
Of the empty shapes.

I get to the point where I must look down,
To find I've an overhead view already
On a superhighway of ants
Who touch each other as they move
Like circuits that bring memories to
Dumb terminals that flower,
Only new worlds to lose myself again in,
As if the light withheld is to explore.

Why I Want to Cry

The man who came and went
Turns out he was a poet
Living in that place of gibberish
Intoxicated into sense
For all his strict rigmaroles
Of grammatical exactitude
In even the most rudimentary
Commercial exchange
The whole time he was
Dreaming of gogyohka
And the way that people never say
What they feel inside
A man who never said
What he was up to
Or why anyone should care
About who he really was
And really wanted to do
Inside his permanent
Impermeable suit
It was a secret place
Shared only with the few
Who would understand
The art of verse is
To go missing chasing the lost

And how I myself only found this out
When he was gone

A Gift of Lace at Sunset

"Given that we’re clearly on a trajectory to have games that are indistinguishable from reality ... the odds we are in base reality are one in billions." - Elon Musk

The pear trees that didn't exist
Are now everywhere in flower.

It's like a vectored simulation
How real this city seems,

As if those darkened windows
All have people behind them

And the scurrying crowds are just code
Before they're quantum entangled at hello.

It's easy to get lost in the details,
The number of bags, say, next to the homeless man

Like I could catch some discrepancy
Simply by moving my eyes.

There's a beauty to all of this
If it's virtual:

Who'd think of that many circular windows
Or those skeleton storefront smiles?

Soon it will be the 1930s outside,
Any pretense of the real lifted like a thumb,

And we may at last admire the maker,
Who may or may not be the one we came from.

After the Rains in Canyon Park

The grass has been waiting for me,

So much to say, it seems,

With so few to hear.

The winter rain has made it

Gleam with green

As it seems to share

How full the pinecones lean

And how yellow the honeysuckle.

Even the succulents are drenched with star blossom.

It has grown as high as the lupine

The monarchs dance around, before they fly

Like paper planes to the next rich nest.

The moss spreads out like a map

Of the untracked, and the cactus fields

Beam again, unrepentant, in sun.

The dark crevasse

Where the homeless sleep

Is now a lake of smoky glass

Where water shimmers in a dialog

Of sun and water moving, where

The still trees’ pulsing thought is seen.

Hidden ducks break the plane

And fracture the thousand-word picture

Of things that endure under sky

Into the waves illusion uses: The endlessness

Of pattern, color, shape, the truth

The defies containment in a brain –

The ducks themselves dissolve

Into the scene, as one realizes it was

The mind and not the eye that saw them.

The shadows then begin to shimmer

As if there’s no existence

In unrefracted light.

The grass notes how its limbs

Point straight up – like us –

To the sky.

New red buds on old grey trees,

New red branches, new green leaves,

And fresh red woodpecker head

To supervise the cleaning.

It remains a permanent mystery

How things get in and leave:

New orange-yellow flowers

In a happy sea of green,

Like certain offerings to sun

And the sun seems to answer back

By dappling the bending grass

With a coat like drops of rain

On fields reborn in green,

Like the past was never different

And you are foolish to even remember

And jasmine bells will always

Accompany you no matter

How the pathway turns.

The violence of water, too,

A fact that’s only captured now

In absence: The hanging

Inflamed roots,

Sand sprayed across the weeds,

Rocks trapped inside of pools.

The clover conjures a spiral of gnats

As the ivy floats up the tallest trees.

The hillside finds room,

Impossibly, for further paintings.

The fingers of grass point here and there

And shiver with awe,

Merely hoping I can feel

The same, or maybe knowing,

For they’re still as I doubt,

And wild while I imagine

The lack of any filter between us

To screen the call of the one.

The egret in the grass knows I’m here

For the pink in her feathers,

Her snake rhythm ways,

As she knows the mouse she’s stalking

Needs to touch the hilltop grass

Before she strikes.

The clouds of the moment

Are the patterns for the sway

Of vibrant grass.

The grey rolls in from the distance,

As if to seal the brightness and shade

Held in this instant,

The perfect light,

The perfect flower,

The blackening tree.

Above Lacuna Beach

The lights on the dark hill
Are at a rarefied remove
From the things we like,
The products we buy,
From our earthly concerns.
They almost look down
Behind their doctor curtains
On this world of joy and chaos,
Almost in control

But there is the moon
That's been chasing us all day
And has escaped up the hill,
That dominates with silence
And by being far away.

Hymns by Hölderlin: Mother Earth

Song of the brothers

Ottmar, Hom and Tello

Ottmar

Instead of being openly nasty, I sing.

So a string plays, from indulgent hands

Like an embarrassing experiment

From the start. But soon a serious slant

Comes happily over the harp

As conductor, master and notes

Prepare themselves for him, and become winged,

So many there are, and together they are beaten

To a pulp

Of sound and, as from the sea, an awakening

Of melodious vibration hovers like endless clouds.

But there’s another sound

Like the clanging harp,

It’s the song

Of the people’s choir.

Then when he’s had sufficient signs

And the power of its floods and fires come into

His mind like the weather, ineffable,

Indeed the holy father

Found no one true to him among the living anymore,

Once the heart of the song had lost the congregation.

But still

Look how the boulder first came to be,

And they were smithed in a shadier shop,

The iron fasteners of the earth,

Before the brooks had rustled in from the mountains,

And groves and cities flourished by the streams,

So the thunderous had

Already made a pure law,

And founded pure sounds.

Hom

Yet nevertheless, O Mighty One,

To whom the lonely sing, and give us songs enough,

Until it’s expressed, as if by us

I mean, our soul's secret.

For often I hear

The old priest's songs

and so

The soul prepares me also with thanks.

But wander into the armament hall

With your hands bound in the age’s futility

And look at the men and the armor,

How sincerely they stand, and one recalls

How the father once tightened the bow

To strike far away from the target,

And everyone believes him

But no one will try to

Be like god, and the arms of man

Descend,

For there’s never a day when the glory robe fits.

The temple columns stand

Abandoned in the time of need,

Maybe the north storm echoes

deep inside the halls,

And the rain makes them pure,

And moss grows and swallows return

In the spring, but it's nameless

In them, the god, and the chalice of praise

And the sacrificial vessel and all the sanctuaries

Buried the enemy in secretive earth.

Tello

Who wants to thank before he receives,

And give an answer, before he has heard?

Not while the exalted speaks

Should he fall into the sound of his voice.

He has a lot to say, and different laws,

And one is, that the lessons never end,

And the ages of the creator are,

Like mountains,

The high protruding swells that go

From sea to sea over the earth,

Many say it is a wanderer,

And the wild wander into the void,

And the horde sweeps over the heights,

Though in the holy shadow,

And on the green slope of the hillside

The shepherd watches the peaks.

So

------------------------------------------------------------------

Der Mutter Erde

Gesang der Brüder

Ottmar Hom Tello

Ottmar

Statt offner Gemeine sing ich Gesang.

So spielt, von erfreulichen Händen

Wie zum Versuche berühret, eine Saite

Von Anfang. Aber freudig ernster neigt

Bald über die Harfe

Der Meister das Haupt und die Töne

Bereiten sich ihm, und werden geflügelt,

So viele sie sind, und zusammen tönt es unter dem

Schlage

Des Weckenden und voll, wie aus Meeren, schwingt

Unendlich sich in die Lüfte die Wolke des Wohllauts.

Doch wird ein anderes noch

Wie der Harfe Klang

Der Gesang sein,

Der Chor des Volks.

Denn wenn er schon der Zeichen genug

Und Fluten in seiner Macht und Wetterflammen

Wie Gedanken hat, der heilige Vater,

unaussprechlich wär er wohl

Und nirgend fänd er wahr sich unter den Lebenden wieder,

Wenn zum Gesange nicht hätt ein Herz die Gemeinde.

Noch aber

Doch wie der Fels erst ward,

Und geschmiedet wurden in schattiger Werkstatt,

die ehernen Festen der Erde,

Noch ehe Bäche rauschten von den Bergen

Und Hain' und Städte blüheten an den Strömen,

So hat er donnernd schon

Geschaffen ein reines Gesetz,

Und reine Laute gegründet.

Hom

Indessen schon', o Mächtiger, des,

Der einsam singt, und gib uns Lieder genug,

Bis ausgesprochen ist, wie wir

Es meinen, unserer Seele Geheimnis.

Denn öfters hört ich

Des alten Priesters Gesänge

und so

Zu danken bereite die Seele mir auch.

Doch wandeln im Waffensaale

Mit gebundener Hand in müßigen Zeiten

Die Männer und schauen die Rüstungen an,

Voll Ernstes stehen sie und einer erzählt,

Wie die Väter sonst den Bogen gespannet

Fernhin des Zieles gewiß,

Und alle glauben es ihm,

Doch keiner darf es versuchen

Wie ein Gott sinken die Arme

Der Menschen,

Auch ziemt ein Feiergewand an jedem Tage sich nicht.

Die Tempelsäulen stehn

Verlassen in Tagen der Not,

Wohl tönet des Nordsturms Echo

tief in den Hallen,

Und der Regen machet sie rein,

Und Moos wächst und es kehren die Schwalben,

In Tagen des Frühlings, namlos aber ist

In ihnen der Gott, und die Schale des Danks

Und Opfergefäß und alle Heiligtümer

Begraben dem Feind in verschwiegener Erde.

Tello

Wer will auch danken, eh er empfängt,

Und Antwort geben, eh er gehört hat?

Ni indes ein Höherer spricht,

Zu fallen in die tönende Rede.

Viel hat er zu sagen und anders Recht,

Und Einer ist, der endet in Stunden nicht,

Und die Zeiten des Schaffenden sind,

Wie Gebirg,

Das hochaufwogend von Meer zu Meer

Hinziehet über die Erde,

Es sagen der Wanderer viele davon,

Und das Wild irrt in den Klüften,

Und die Horde schweifet über die Höhen,

In heiligem Schatten aber,

Am grünen Abhang wohnet

Der Hirt und schauet die Gipfel.

So

Valentine's Day Commute

Today it's like a drape has dropped,
And every third face lacks a something —

They're not included in the dance
And can't understand the alchemic skulduggery
Where they're deemed not to fit on this date,

As if the hearts in the air can now be seen

And they are mocking them,
The faces whose secrets are subtly betrayed,
Who shred, that army of titans, every tree on the way.

There's nothing in the sky that doesn't drop
For more than a moment

And there's always this moment of silence
Before one reaches
And after one retracts.

These autists can feel how much is sacrificed
For each victory of every heart,
As they can't understand the inevitable math
Of what 1 part plus 1 part equals.

Still, the mystery hangs like this colorless cloud.

A poet in a rain hat
Runs through his recent verses with a pen.
The characters are blue. He smiles,
As if he never had before, as if the words
He wrote are suddenly something real.

Some Harmless Rhetoric Before the Board

Charles had dissected those Ubuntu motivations –

What indigenous boys can teach about making money –

How we’re hard-wired for hugs, with a longing to belong,

And he had applied it to hierarchy systems, by asking 

“How can we best construct a bridge to being … with each other?”

What the Dalai Lama told him about teams, er, being, er, beings:

It is passion that moves us from fear into wisdom,

Enables us to obliterate the village for science.

"Your competitors report,” he suavely said, "It's the softer side

Eats strategy for lunch,” for there are always prisoners to take

But no such thing as culture,

Only strains of sub-culture, which is only the bacterial individual

In a shadow, of the values, thus we must bring the voices

In from the periphery to the middle, so that they can be …

Co-opted? Defanged? Otherwise managed?

No. We must learn how to value with a no,

Without that irritable leap into judgment.

Then, by way of a rare note of culture in

Battle formations, and with a way-too-guilt-stricken look,

He quoted the poets, on the magic of words

And the genius of boldness, and humbly concluded

That the kingdom must extract its idle dreamers,

For they give visionaries a bad name.

Implications of a Dream

The book might've been happy
If he actually had a wife
And she was Jewish instead of
Admissions-friendly Irish,
And the Joyce decoding guide
Was discovered at the same time as the text
-- So much greatness here at Harvard;
This one has scaled Matterhorns,
That one has moved them --
They don't seem as pleased to be telling me this
As I am presumed to be in hearing,
But that's why I am here, somehow,
To listen with compassion
-- 13 years of positive thoughts and
I'll be on my way, they say --
It is an education,
More than the tricks of the trade
To ladder and cheat one's escape
Through the hatch of trap-door courses.

Is there anyone here
-- A quantum entanglement theorist, say,
In some unlabeled basement crypt --
Who is free of the ennui
That blows in from the Consequence River?
People blow through here as well,
In the end, to learn how to keep
The lies they tell themselves
From being found out by others
-- The others, at least, who don't matter.
There's a room somewhere
In this yellowing air
Where a poet once sat,
Before the sky became a ceiling.

The Seeds on Post Street

We yearn for what is not
Without learning what is;

We lean into the skylarks
Of the profoundly blue latitudes

When we cannot hear the questions
Of the local songbirds.

Could it be that fantasy
Is as close as we can be

To what we know,
Somewhere, is real?

The outline of the ideal seems clearer
Than what we call the actual,

For it is not beyond, but behind us,
The residue of a fractured fall;

The screams of pieces,
And the comforting voice from above

Who helps us remember
Everything is love.

Upon Being Told at Work "I'm So Glad You're Not a Poet"

We all tell stories
But no one tries a poem
Not even poets

Hymns by Hölderlin: “As if on holiday …”

As if on holiday, to see the field,

A farmer goes, in morning, when

Out of hot night the coolness of the lightning fell

Continuously and thunder still far away,

On its shores once again steps the stream,

And the fresh ground turns green

And from the heavens a reassuring rain

The grapevine drips and glistens

In the silent sun where stand the trees of the grove:

So they stand in weather more favorable,

They, not the master alone, the wonderful

All-encompassing nurtures in simple surroundings

The mighty, the god-like beauty of nature.

Thus when she’s sleeping she shines for the entire year

In heaven or under the plants or among the people,

So mournful the poet’s countenance too,

You appear to be alone, yet see eternally.

For prophecy is silence too.

But at present I wait and see it coming,

And what I see, is the holy, is my word.

For she, herself, who is older than the age

And is above all the gods of evening and the east,

This nature, now with weapon clang awakened,

And from the aether down to the void below

From firm law established, as once, has begotten hallowed chaos,

To feel the new enthusiasm,

The originary, afresh.

And as in the eye, a fire gleams in man,

If high in design; so again

New signs come symbolize the actions of the world now,

A fire ignited in the souls of poets.

And what happened before, but scarcely felt,

Is only disclosed now,

What smiled at us when the acres were built,

In their servant form they are known,

The all-inspiriting, the forces of the gods.

Do you ask for her? In the song wafts her spirit,

When from the sun of the day and warming earth

Sprung forth, and the rage, in midair, of the divine

To be prepared in the depths of the age,

And interpretation full, and more clearer heard

Wandering between heaven and earth and among the peoples.

The collective unconsciousness is hushed to

Conclusion, in the soul of the poets,

That they soon sympathized, long acquainted

With the infinite, by remembering

Shaken, and they, by a sacred ray inflamed,

Bore fruit born out of love, as the work of gods and humans,

The song, which succeeds by witnessing both.

So fell, as the poets said, when the God they

Coveted was discovered, lightning on Semele's house

And the god-like-afflicted gave birth,

The fruit of the thunders, the sacredest Bacchus.

And so now the sons of the earth drink

The celestial fire free of risk.  

Still we deserve it, under the thunders of God,

Our poet! Who, with his own hand, stands unconcealed

With his head to the ray of the father,

To catch and free song for the people,

Shrouding his heavenly gift out of reach.

For we’re only pure of heart,

Like children, the fault is not in our hands,

Unlike the father's ray, the pure, it burns

And mourns and shudders, with deep compassion for the

Advantaged, the suffering, in God’s tumbling storms

As he approaches, his heart, unwavering.

But woe to me! If from

Woeful me!

And I'll say,

I was called, to behold the celestials,

They, they themselves, threw me down among the living,

The false priest, into the dark, so that I

Sing my song of warning to the scholars.

There …

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Wie wenn am Feiertage ...”

Wie wenn am Feiertage, das Feld zu sehn,

Ein Landmann geht, des Morgens, wenn

Aus heißer Nacht die kühlenden Blitze fielen

Die ganze Zeit und fern noch tönet der Donner,

In sein Gestade wieder tritt der Strom,

Und frisch der Boden grünt

Und von des Himmels erfreuendem Regen

Der Weinstock trauft und glänzend

In stiller Sonne stehn die Bäume des Haines:

So stehn sie unter günstiger Witterung,

Sie, die kein Meister allein, die wunderbar

Allgegenwärtig erzieht in leichtem Umfangen

Die mächtige, die göttlichschöne Natur.

Drum wenn zu schlafen sie scheint zu Zeiten des Jahrs

Am Himmel oder unter den Pflanzen oder den Völkern,

So trauert der Dichter Angesicht auch,

Sie scheinen allein zu sein, doch ahnen sie immer.

Denn ahnend ruhet sie selbst auch.

Jetzt aber tagts! Ich harrt und sah es kommen,

Und was ich sah, das Heilige sei mein Wort.

Denn sie, sie selbst, die älter denn die Zeiten

Und über die Götter des Abends und Orients ist,

Die Natur ist jetzt mit Waffenklang erwacht,

Und hoch vom Aether bis zum Abgrund nieder

Nach festem Gesetze, wie einst, aus heiligem Chaos gezeugt,[122]

Fühlt neu die Begeisterung sich,

Die Allerschaffende, wieder.

Und wie im Aug ein Feuer dem Manne glänzt,

Wenn hohes er entwarf, so ist

Von neuem an den Zeichen, den Taten der Welt jetzt

Ein Feuer angezündet in Seelen der Dichter.

Und was zuvor geschah, doch kaum gefühlt,

Ist offenbar erst jetzt,

Und die uns lächelnd den Acker gebauet,

In Knechtsgestalt, sie sind erkannt,

Die Allebendigen, die Kräfte der Götter.

Erfrägst du sie? im Liede wehet ihr Geist,

Wenn es der Sonne des Tags und warmer Erd

Entwächst, und Wettern, die in der Luft, und andern,

Die vorbereiteter in Tiefen der Zeit,

Und deutungsvoller, und vernehmlicher uns

Hinwandeln zwischen Himmel und Erd und unter den Völkern.

Des gemeinsamen Geistes Gedanken sind,

Still endend, in der Seele des Dichters,

Daß schnellbetroffen sie, Unendlichem

Bekannt seit langer Zeit, von Erinnerung

Erbebt, und ihr, von heilgem Strahl entzündet,

Die Frucht in Liebe geboren, der Götter und Menschen Werk,

Der Gesang, damit er beiden zeuge, glückt.

So fiel, wie Dichter sagen, da sie sichtbar

Den Gott zu sehen begehrte, sein Blitz auf Semeles Haus

Und die göttlichgetroffne gebar,

Die Frucht des Gewitters, den heiligen Bacchus.

Und daher trinken himmlisches Feuer jetzt

Die Erdensöhne ohne Gefahr.

Doch uns gebührt es, unter Gottes Gewittern,

Ihr Dichter! mit entblößtem Haupte zu stehen,

Des Vaters Strahl, ihn selbst, mit eigner Hand

Zu fassen und dem Volk ins Lied

Gehüllt die himmlische Gabe zu reichen.

Denn sind nur reinen Herzens,

Wie Kinder, wir, sind schuldlos unsere Hände,

Des Vaters Strahl, der reine, versengt es nicht

Und tieferschüttert, die Leiden des Stärkeren

Mitleidend, bleibt in den hochherstürzenden Stürmen

Des Gottes, wenn er nahet, das Herz doch fest.

Doch weh mir! wenn von

Weh mir!

Und sag ich gleich,

Ich sei genaht, die Himmlischen zu schauen,

Sie selbst, sie werfen mich tief unter die Lebenden,

Den falschen Priester, ins Dunkel, daß ich

Das warnende Lied den Gelehrigen singe.

Dort

Day in the Life of a Homeless Poem

I don’t know whether to grieve or to celebrate –

Such are the anomalies of the products of time –

The weighing of loss and gain on an imaginary scale –

Like that shopping cart with all that matters inside –

There’s a kind of intelligence, too large for this moment –

Our fractured experience shining from mirrors

As if it will stay forever unfinished.

Such godly light on weeds and broken lamps –

The foam beds laid next to the tumbleweeds –

It fills the commuters with desire

To make of themselves something real –

Despite the silence of the nascent berries –

Because our gifts are down the road we tarry here

At the tents beside the riverbed –

Where the offerings of sun fell back to earth

To sweep around what’s broken like a dance

– So hard, it seems, this learning – without a prod

Or rod or forehead star from the masters high above –

Except what happens here, beside this living stream

That flashes back the thing we only see –

Light and leaf who will not be told apart –

A grace that’s unattainable to all but the will –

Whose garish letters bend in paint here

Like cities lining up their magic for release –

As if to say “Beauty is, again, too ubiquitous” –

That shade of almost pink along the rock path –

The wrinkles in the river under the bridge –

The branches that grow out from the stone –

These, somehow, can’t be heard except as music,

A distant tune so elusive it makes us uncomfortable –

Reminds us that we do not exist

Except in what we feel.

The faces are what pull me back –

So many lifetimes unresolved with every one of them –

Where can the sun go at night in the face of such lilac?

The electric light holds, but not to resolve

But because no one will turn it off –

No one comes out

To prove they are who they say they are –

Although that is what is always on their minds –

The sunset shatters across the sky –

As if what’s kept from us can't be shared –

We would not know how to walk in that light

In the face of so many shadows –

The road is open for the one –

But that is what is missing

In the scurry of the whistling leaves –

And as the darkness falls the other is ours 

As if the first of the moon has given its permission

To chase down the light as if a ghost

And the ghost as if a light –

It’s a dance that consummates in sleep

And further, ever distant and more hopeful dreams:

More places to escape, people to solve,

Floods of hinted memories

To forget immediately …

Until the light begins to seem again as if it could be a friend –

As the first of the morning trucks moves in

To rouse the people in the bushes –

As if there was ever anything more than a hope –

The staring at you from a distant view –

To be understood in lieu of understanding yourself –

The act of knowing what you aren’t is a kind of wisdom –

If it is of them, in the end, not of you, it is something –

Faces – the endless poignancy you lack – can become one’s familiar,

The ever-expanding stick to reach out for

That takes you as far as you want it to go –

Though it was never really there at all.

Elegies by Hölderlin: Homecoming

1.

It’s still bright inside the Alps, though it is night and a cloud,

     Weaving its jubilant verse, covers the yawning valley.

The mountain air frolics to and fro, plays pitch and toss to

     Rough up the pines, and the last gleam of light dwindles down.

Chaos shudders in struggle then gently hurries along,

     Young in shape, yet strong, it celebrates a loving fight

Under the crags, it staggers and sways by the eternal gates,

     For the bacchanalians are approaching morning.

Since it waxes endlessly there, the year and the sacred

     Hours, the days, they are audaciously arranged, mixed up.

But note we’re in the age of the thunderbird, between the

     Mountains, high in the air it dwells and calls to the day.

It watches now, keeps vigil on the depths of the village

     Fearlessly, at a privileged height, up under the peaks.

Forbear of progress, for already, like lightning, the old

     Wellsprings fall to the ground under plummeting steam, and

Echo around, and the arm of the overwhelming foundry

     Hands over bounties, awakens by day and by night.

2.

Stillness shimmers meanwhile, overhead from the heights of silver,

     Already the luminous snow is full of roses.

And even higher up above the light resides the pure

     Blissful God delighted by the play of holy rays.

He lives alone in silence, his face seems a radiance,

     And the kind ethereal shine appears to give life,

To create pleasure, with us, as soon as, versed in dimensions,

     The skilled in breathing hesitate too, and God gently

Shines golden fortune on the towns and houses and opens

     With soft rain the land, and you, brooding clouds, then send out

The familiar winds, and you, the suavity of spring,

      With your slow hand pleases with sadness once again,

As he refreshes the ages, the creative, and seizes

     The silent hearts of an old and declining people,

And works down into the depths, to open and to brighten,

     How great is his love, and now another life begins,

Grace flourishes, as before, and the present spirit comes,

     And a happier courage, and again the wings swell.

3.

A lot I said to him, because whatever poets think

     Or sing, it is mostly of the angels and of him;

A lot I asked, in love of the fatherland, it was not

     Uninvited, once the spirit gave abrupt command;

A lot I worried for you as well, in the fatherland,

     Who smiles with holy gratitude at the refugees,

On you, people of the country! The lake, meanwhile, swayed me,

     And the oarsman sat calmly and applauded the ride.

Far along the vast plain of lake was a joyful cascade

     Underneath the sails, and now the city brightly blooms

In the early morning, as the ship has come, likely from

     The shadowy Alps, to rest now, inside the harbor.

The shore here is warm, the valley friendly, open-ended,

     Beautifully lit by paths, and the green shimmers on me.

Gardens hold hands and the glistening buds, just begun, stand,

     And the singing of the birds summons the wanderer.

Everything seems familiar, the greeting that rushes past too

     Seems that of friends, as if any look is related.

4.

But of course! The native country, the soil of the homeland,

     What you’re looking for, it’s near, it already meets you.

And it’s not in vain, that you would, like a son, at the gate

     Of rustling wave seek and see for it loving names,

To sing of, wandering man, the beatific Lindau!

     One of the more hospitable ports of the country,

Where it’s lovely to go into the promising distance,

     Where the miracles are, and the god-like animals,

High in the flats as the reckless Rhine breaks fresh ground below,

     And wrenches out of the cliffs the euphoric valley,

To go, there through the bright mountains, all the way to Como,

     Or down, in the wanderings of day, to open sea;

But you are more alluring to me, the sacred portal,

     The approach of home, where I know the flowering ways,

To call on the land and brighten the vales of the Neckar,

     And the verdure, the forests, the saintly trees, where to

Please the oak merges with the silent birch and beech, and a

     Spot of mountain kindly takes me into custody.

5.

There they receive me. O voice of the city, my mother!

     As we meet, you stir up long-ago understood things!

Still they exist! The sun and delight still flourish, my dearest!

     And it is nearly as clear in the eye as before.

Yes! The ancient remains! It thrives and it ripens, but there are

     None who live and love, who have let their true hearts return.

Only the best, who discover what is underneath the arch

     Where the holy quiet resides, are saved, young or old.

I speak in laments. It’s an enjoyment. But tomorrow and

     In the future, when we join the living field outside

Among the blossoms of the tree, in the festivals of spring,

     I will talk with a lot of hope about it, dear ones!

A lot I have heard from the great father’s lips and have said

     Nothing to him, who from rarefied heights refreshes

The wanderlust of the age, as he rules above the mountains,

     And almost concedes us ethereal gifts, and calls

For brighter song as he sends a lot of good cheer. O you,

     Do not delay, sustain her! The angel of the year!

6.

Angel of the house, come! In the veins is all of life, all are

     Together rejoicing, particles of the divine!

Ennoble! Rejuvenate! So there’s nothing but humanly

     Good, so not one hour of the day is free of joy and such

Joy too, as now, when lovers find each other again, like it

     Belongs to them, fitting for all their benedictions.

When we bless the meal, who shall I call, and if we rest from

     The day's activities, say, how do I convey thanks?

Do I call to the high one? God does not love the unseemly,

     To apprehend him, is almost too tiny a joy.

Often we must keep our silence; the holy names are absent, 

     Though our hearts still beat does our speech yet stay behind?

But the play of strings lends every hour its sounds, and maybe

     The heavenly, which is always near, will be obtained.

It prepares, as our fears, which always came from the inside

     Of our joys, are already almost consummated.

Sorrow like this, in the soul, is what, propitious or not,

     Must sustain a singer, but, too often, no others.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Heimkunft

1.

Drin in den Alpen ists noch helle Nacht und die Wolke,

     Freudiges dichtend, sie deckt drinnen das gähnende Tal.

Dahin, dorthin toset und stürzt die scherzende Bergluft,

     Schroff durch Tannen herab glänzet und schwindet ein Strahl.

Langsam eilt und kämpft das freudigschauernde Chaos,

     Jung an Gestalt, doch stark, feiert es liebenden Streit

Unter den Felsen, es gärt und wankt in den ewigen Schranken,

     Denn bacchantischer zieht drinnen der Morgen herauf.

Denn es wächst unendlicher dort das Jahr und die heilgen

     Stunden, die Tage, sie sind kühner geordnet, gemischt.

Dennoch merket die Zeit der Gewittervogel und zwischen

     Bergen, hoch in der Luft weilt er und rufet den Tag.

Jetzt auch wachet und schaut in der Tiefe drinnen das Dörflein

     Furchtlos, Hohem vertraut, unter den Gipfeln hinauf.

Wachstum ahnend, denn schon, wie Blitze, fallen die alten

     Wasserquellen, der Grund unter den Stürzenden dampft,

Echo tönet umher, und die unermeßliche Werkstatt

     Reget bei Tag und Nacht, Gaben versendend, den Arm.

2.

Ruhig glänzen indes die silbernen Höhen darüber,

     Voll mit Rosen ist schon droben der leuchtende Schnee.

Und noch höher hinauf wohnt über dem Lichte der reine

     Selige Gott vom Spiel heiliger Strahlen erfreut.

Stille wohnt er allein und hell erscheinet sein Antlitz,

     Der ätherische scheint Leben zu geben geneigt,

Freude zu schaffen, mit uns, wie oft, wenn, kundig des Maßes,

     Kundig der Atmenden auch zögernd und schonend der Gott

Wohlgediegenes Glück den Städten und Häusern und milde

     Regen, zu öffnen das Land, brütende Wolken, und euch,

Trauteste Lüfte dann, euch, sanfte Frühlinge, sendet,

     Und mit langsamer Hand Traurige wieder erfreut,

Wenn er die Zeiten erneut, der Schöpferische, die stillen

     Herzen der alternden Menschen erfrischt und ergreift,

Und hinab in die Tiefe wirkt, und öffnet und aufhellt,

     Wie ers liebet, und jetzt wieder ein Leben beginnt,

Anmut blühet, wie einst, und gegenwärtiger Geist kömmt,

     Und ein freudiger Mut wieder die Fittige schwellt.

3.

Vieles sprach ich zu ihm, denn, was auch Dichtende sinnen

     Oder singen, es gilt meistens den Engeln und ihm;

Vieles bat ich, zu lieb dem Vaterlande, damit nicht

     Ungebeten uns einst plötzlich befiele der Geist;

Vieles für euch auch, die im Vaterlande besorgt sind,

     Denen der heilige Dank lächelnd die Flüchtlinge bringt,

Landesleute! für euch, indessen wiegte der See mich,

     Und der Ruderer saß ruhig und lobte die Fahrt.

Weit in des Sees Ebene wars Ein freudiges Wallen

     Unter den Segeln und jetzt blühet und hellet die Stadt

Dort in der Frühe sich auf, wohl her von schattigen Alpen

     Kommt geleitet und ruht nun in dem Hafen das Schiff.

Warm ist das Ufer hier und freundlich offene Tale,

     Schön von Pfaden erhellt, grünen und schimmern mich an.

Gärten stehen gesellt und die glänzende Knospe beginnt schon,

     Und des Vogels Gesang ladet den Wanderer ein.

Alles scheinet vertraut, der vorübereilende Gruß auch

     Scheint von Freunden, es scheint jegliche Miene verwandt.

4.

Freilich wohl! das Geburtsland ists, der Boden der Heimat,

     Was du suchest, es ist nahe, begegnet dir schon.

Und umsonst nicht steht, wie ein Sohn, am wellenumrauschten

     Tor und siehet und sucht liebende Namen für dich,

Mit Gesang, ein wandernder Mann, glückseliges Lindau!

     Eine der gastlichen Pforten des Landes ist dies,

Reizend hinauszugehn in die vielversprechende Ferne,

     Dort, wo die Wunder sind, dort, wo das göttliche Wild

Hoch in die Ebnen herab der Rhein die verwegene Bahn bricht,

     Und aus Felsen hervor ziehet das jauchzende Tal,

Dort hinein, durchs helle Gebirg, nach Como zu wandern,

     Oder hinab, wie der Tag wandelt, den offenen See;

Aber reizender mir bist du, geweihete Pforte!

     Heimzugehn, wo bekannt blühende Wege mir sind,

Dort zu besuchen das Land und die schönen Tale des Neckars,

     Und die Wälder, das Grün heiliger Bäume, wo gern

Sich die Eiche gesellt mit stillen Birken und Buchen,

     Und in Bergen ein Ort freundlich gefangen mich nimmt.

5.

Dort empfangen sie mich. O Stimme der Stadt, der Mutter!

     O du triffest, du regst Langegelerntes mir auf!

Dennoch sind sie es noch! noch blühet die Sonn und die Freud euch,

     O ihr Liebsten! und fast heller im Auge, wie sonst.

Ja! das Alte noch ists! Es gedeihet und reifet, doch keines,

     Was da lebet und liebt, lässet die Treue zurück.

Aber das Beste, der Fund, der unter des heiligen Friedens

     Bogen lieget, er ist Jungen und Alten gespart.

Törig red ich. Es ist die Freude. Doch morgen und künftig,

     Wenn wir gehen und schaun draußen das lebende Feld

Unter den Blüten des Baums, in den Feiertagen des Frühlings

     Red und hoff ich mit euch vieles, ihr Lieben! davon.

Vieles hab ich gehört vom großen Vater und habe

     Lange geschwiegen von ihm, welcher die wandernde Zeit

Droben in Höhen erfrischt, und waltet über Gebirgen,

     Der gewähret uns bald himmlische Gaben und ruft

Hellern Gesang und schickt viel gute Geister. O säumt nicht,

     Kommt, Erhaltenden ihr! Engel des Jahres! und ihr,

6.

Engel des Hauses, kommt! in die Adern alle des Lebens,

     Alle freuend zugleich, teile das Himmlische sich!

Adle! verjünge! damit nichts Menschlichgutes, damit nicht

     Eine Stunde des Tags ohne die Frohen und auch

Solche Freude, wie jetzt, wenn Liebende wieder sich finden,

     Wie es gehört für sie, schicklich geheiliget sei.

Wenn wir segnen das Mahl, wen darf ich nennen, und wenn wir

     Ruhn vom Leben des Tags, saget, wie bring ich den Dank?

Nenn ich den Hohen dabei? Unschickliches liebet ein Gott nicht,

     Ihn zu fassen, ist fast unsere Freude zu klein.

Schweigen müssen wir oft; es fehlen heilige Namen,

     Herzen schlagen und doch bleibet die Rede zurück?

Aber ein Saitenspiel leiht jeder Stunde die Töne,

     Und erfreuet vielleicht Himmlische, welche sich nahn.

Das bereitet und so ist auch beinahe die Sorge

     Schon befriediget, die unter das Freudige kam.

Sorgen, wie diese, muß, gern oder nicht, in der Seele

     Tragen ein Sänger und oft, aber die anderen nicht.

Elegies by Hölderlin: Homecoming (6)

Angel of the house, come! In the veins is all of life, all are

     Together rejoicing, particles of the divine!

Ennoble! Rejuvenate! So there’s nothing but humanly

     Good, so not one hour of the day is free of joy and such

Joy too, as now, when lovers find each other again, like it

     Belongs to them, fitting for all their benedictions.

When we bless the meal, who shall I call, and if we rest from

     The day's activities, say, how do I convey thanks?

Do I call to the high one? God does not love the unseemly,

     To apprehend him, is almost too tiny a joy.

Often we must keep our silence; the holy names are absent, 

     Though our hearts still beat does our speech yet stay behind?

But the play of strings lends every hour its sounds, and maybe

     The heavenly, which is always near, will be obtained.

It prepares, as our fears, which always came from the inside

     Of our joys, are already almost consummated.

Sorrow like this, in the soul, is what, propitious or not,

     Must sustain a singer, but, too often, no others.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Heimkunft (6)
Engel des Hauses, kommt! in die Adern alle des Lebens,

     Alle freuend zugleich, teile das Himmlische sich!

Adle! verjünge! damit nichts Menschlichgutes, damit nicht

     Eine Stunde des Tags ohne die Frohen und auch

Solche Freude, wie jetzt, wenn Liebende wieder sich finden,

     Wie es gehört für sie, schicklich geheiliget sei.

Wenn wir segnen das Mahl, wen darf ich nennen, und wenn wir

     Ruhn vom Leben des Tags, saget, wie bring ich den Dank?

Nenn ich den Hohen dabei? Unschickliches liebet ein Gott nicht,

     Ihn zu fassen, ist fast unsere Freude zu klein.

Schweigen müssen wir oft; es fehlen heilige Namen,

     Herzen schlagen und doch bleibet die Rede zurück?

Aber ein Saitenspiel leiht jeder Stunde die Töne,

     Und erfreuet vielleicht Himmlische, welche sich nahn.

Das bereitet und so ist auch beinahe die Sorge

     Schon befriediget, die unter das Freudige kam.

Sorgen, wie diese, muß, gern oder nicht, in der Seele

     Tragen ein Sänger und oft, aber die anderen nicht.

Elegies by Hölderlin: Homecoming (5)

There they receive me. O voice of the city, my mother!

     As we meet, you stir up long-ago understood things!

Still they exist! The sun and delight still flourish, my dearest!

     And it is nearly as clear in the eye as before.

Yes! The ancient remains! It thrives and it ripens, but there are

     None who live and love, who have let their true hearts return.

Only the best, who discover what is underneath the arch

     Where the holy quiet resides, are saved, young or old.

I speak in laments. It’s an enjoyment. But tomorrow and

     In the future, when we join the living field outside

Among the blossoms of the tree, in the festivals of spring,

     I will talk with a lot of hope about it, dear ones!

A lot I have heard from the great father’s lips and have said

     Nothing to him, who from rarefied heights refreshes

The wanderlust of the age, as he rules above the mountains,

     And almost concedes us ethereal gifts, and calls

For brighter song as he sends a lot of good cheer. O you,

     Do not delay, sustain her! The angel of the year!

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Heimkunft (5)

Dort empfangen sie mich. O Stimme der Stadt, der Mutter!

     O du triffest, du regst Langegelerntes mir auf!

Dennoch sind sie es noch! noch blühet die Sonn und die Freud euch,

     O ihr Liebsten! und fast heller im Auge, wie sonst.

Ja! das Alte noch ists! Es gedeihet und reifet, doch keines,

     Was da lebet und liebt, lässet die Treue zurück.

Aber das Beste, der Fund, der unter des heiligen Friedens

     Bogen lieget, er ist Jungen und Alten gespart.

Törig red ich. Es ist die Freude. Doch morgen und künftig,

     Wenn wir gehen und schaun draußen das lebende Feld

Unter den Blüten des Baums, in den Feiertagen des Frühlings

     Red und hoff ich mit euch vieles, ihr Lieben! davon.

Vieles hab ich gehört vom großen Vater und habe

     Lange geschwiegen von ihm, welcher die wandernde Zeit

Droben in Höhen erfrischt, und waltet über Gebirgen,

     Der gewähret uns bald himmlische Gaben und ruft

Hellern Gesang und schickt viel gute Geister. O säumt nicht,

     Kommt, Erhaltenden ihr! Engel des Jahres! und ihr,

Elegies by Hölderlin: Homecoming (4)

But of course! The native country, the soil of the homeland,

     What you’re looking for, it’s near, it already meets you.

And it’s not in vain, that you would, like a son, at the gate

     Of rustling wave seek and see for it loving names,

To sing of, wandering man, the beatific Lindau!

     One of the more hospitable ports of the country,

Where it’s lovely to go into the promising distance,

     Where the miracles are, and the god-like animals,

High in the flats as the reckless Rhine breaks fresh ground below,

     And wrenches out of the cliffs the euphoric valley,

To go, there through the bright mountains, all the way to Como,

     Or down, in the wanderings of day, to open sea;

But you are more alluring to me, the sacred portal,

     The approach of home, where I know the flowering ways,

To call on the land and brighten the vales of the Neckar,

     And the verdure, the forests, the saintly trees, where to

Please the oak merges with the silent birch and beech, and a

     Spot of mountain kindly takes me into custody.

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Heimkunft (4)
Freilich wohl! das Geburtsland ists, der Boden der Heimat,
     Was du suchest, es ist nahe, begegnet dir schon.

Und umsonst nicht steht, wie ein Sohn, am wellenumrauschten

     Tor und siehet und sucht liebende Namen für dich,

Mit Gesang, ein wandernder Mann, glückseliges Lindau!

     Eine der gastlichen Pforten des Landes ist dies,

Reizend hinauszugehn in die vielversprechende Ferne,

     Dort, wo die Wunder sind, dort, wo das göttliche Wild

Hoch in die Ebnen herab der Rhein die verwegene Bahn bricht,

     Und aus Felsen hervor ziehet das jauchzende Tal,

Dort hinein, durchs helle Gebirg, nach Como zu wandern,

     Oder hinab, wie der Tag wandelt, den offenen See;

Aber reizender mir bist du, geweihete Pforte!

     Heimzugehn, wo bekannt blühende Wege mir sind,

Dort zu besuchen das Land und die schönen Tale des Neckars,

     Und die Wälder, das Grün heiliger Bäume, wo gern

Sich die Eiche gesellt mit stillen Birken und Buchen,

     Und in Bergen ein Ort freundlich gefangen mich nimmt.

Elegies by Hölderlin: Homecoming (3)

A lot I said to him, because whatever poets think

     Or sing, it is mostly of the angels and of him;

A lot I asked, in love of the fatherland, it was not

     Uninvited, once the spirit gave abrupt command;

A lot I worried for you as well, in the fatherland,

     Who smiles with holy gratitude at the refugees,

On you, people of the country! The lake, meanwhile, swayed me,

     And the oarsman sat calmly and applauded the ride.

Far along the vast plain of lake was a joyful cascade

     Underneath the sails, and now the city brightly blooms

In the early morning, as the ship has come, likely from

     The shadowy Alps, to rest now, inside the harbor.

The shore here is warm, the valley friendly, open-ended,

     Beautifully lit by paths, and the green shimmers on me.

Gardens hold hands and the glistening buds, just begun, stand,

     And the singing of the birds summons the wanderer.

Everything seems familiar, the greeting that rushes past too

     Seems that of friends, as if any look is related.

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Heimkunft (3)

Vieles sprach ich zu ihm, denn, was auch Dichtende sinnen

     Oder singen, es gilt meistens den Engeln und ihm;

Vieles bat ich, zu lieb dem Vaterlande, damit nicht

     Ungebeten uns einst plötzlich befiele der Geist;

Vieles für euch auch, die im Vaterlande besorgt sind,

     Denen der heilige Dank lächelnd die Flüchtlinge bringt,

Landesleute! für euch, indessen wiegte der See mich,

     Und der Ruderer saß ruhig und lobte die Fahrt.

Weit in des Sees Ebene wars Ein freudiges Wallen

     Unter den Segeln und jetzt blühet und hellet die Stadt

Dort in der Frühe sich auf, wohl her von schattigen Alpen

     Kommt geleitet und ruht nun in dem Hafen das Schiff.

Warm ist das Ufer hier und freundlich offene Tale,

     Schön von Pfaden erhellt, grünen und schimmern mich an.

Gärten stehen gesellt und die glänzende Knospe beginnt schon,

     Und des Vogels Gesang ladet den Wanderer ein.

Alles scheinet vertraut, der vorübereilende Gruß auch

     Scheint von Freunden, es scheint jegliche Miene verwandt.