Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, ATTA TROLL; A SUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM: CAPUT 13, by HEINRICH HEINE


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

ATTA TROLL; A SUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM: CAPUT 13, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: In the black and rocky caldron
Last Line: Would they take the passage-money.
Subject(s): Kisses; Night; Silence; Bedtime


IN the black and rocky caldron
Rest the waters deep of ocean;
Stars, all pale and melancholy,
Peep from heaven. Night reigns, and silence.

Night and silence. Oars are moving.
Like a splashing wondrous secret
Floats the bark. The old man's nieces
Play the part of ferrymen,

Joyously and nimbly rowing;
Ofttimes glisten in the darkness
Their stout naked arms, illumined
By the stars, -- their great blue eyes, too.

By my side Lascaro sitting
Is as pale and mute as usual,
And the fearful thought shoots through me;
Is he but a very corpse then?

I myself, -- am I dead also,
And embarking on my journey
With my ghostly comrades by me
To the chilly realm of shadows?

And this lake, can it be Styx's
Gloomy flood? Has Proserpina,
In default of Charon's presence,
Sent her waiting-maids to fetch me?

No! I am not yet departed
And extinguish'd; in my spirit
Is the living flame of life still
Glowing, blazing and exulting.

And these maidens, gaily pulling
At their oars, and o'er me splashing
With the water dripping from them,
Full of merriment and laughter, --

These two fresh and sprightly damsels
Are most certainly not ghostly
Chambermaids in hell residing,
Waiting-maids of Proserpina!

That I might be fully certain
Of their upper-worldliness,
And by practical experience
Ascertain my own existence,

Hastily my lips applied I
To their rosy cheeks' soft dimples,
And then framed this syllogism:
Yes, I kiss, and so I'm living!

When we reach'd the shore, again I
Kiss'd the pair of kindly maidens;
In this coin, and no other,
Would they take the passage-money.





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