Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, GERMANY; A WINTER TALE: CAPUT 27, by HEINRICH HEINE


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

GERMANY; A WINTER TALE: CAPUT 27, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: When summer's pleasant days have come
Last Line: Thou hadst better mind thy behaviour!
Subject(s): Courts & Courtiers; Death; Germany; Goddesses & Gods; Mythology; Summer; Royal Court Life; Royalty; Kings; Queens; Dead, The; Germans


WHEN summer's pleasant days have come
I'll tell you all the history
Of the other wonders that came to pass
In that long night of mystery.

The olden hypocritical race,
Thank heaven, is rapidly dying;
To the grave it is sinking, and owes its death
To its ceaseless habit of lying.

Another race is rising up fast,
By rouge and by sin untarnish'd,
Of genial humour and thoughts, -- to it
I'll tell my story unvarnish'd.

The youth which the poet's goodness and pride
Appreciates, puts forth its blossom,
And warms itself at his radiant soul,
And against his feeling bosom.

My heart is loving as the light,
And pure and chaste as the fire;
The noblest Graces themselves have tuned
The chords of my sweet lyre.

'Tis the selfsame lyre that in his songs
My worthy father uses, --
The poet Aristophanes,
The favourite of the Muses.

In the previous chapter I tried my hand
At copying the conclusion
Of the play of the "Birds," which certainly is
My father's finest effusion.

The "Frogs" is also capital. This
Is now, in a German translation,
Perform'd, I am told, on the stage at Berlin
For his Majesty's edification.

The King likes the piece. This shows his taste
For the old-fashion'd style of joking;
The late King far more amusement found
In modern frogs' loud croaking.

The King likes the piece. But nevertheless
Were the author still living, I kindly
Would counsel him to trust himself
In Prussia not too blindly.

The genuine Aristophanes
Would find it no subject for laughter;
We should see him move, wherever he went,
With a chorus of gendarmes after.

O King, I really wish thee well
When this piece of advice I'm giving:
Due reverence pay to the poets who're dead,
And tender be to the living.

Affront the living poets not,
With weapons and flames they are furnish'd,
More terrible far than the lightnings of Jove,
By the poets created and burnish'd.

Affront the gods in Olympus who dwell,
Regardless whether they know it;
Affront the mightiest Lord of all,
But O, affront not the poet!

The deities harshly avenge in truth
Man's crimes, and allow him no shelter;
The fire of hell is passably hot,
And there he must roast and must swelter

Yet pious steps can the sinner release
From the flames; for saying masses
And giving to churches with liberal hand
From torment a certain pass is.

When the days are accomplish'd, then Christ will descend,
And burst hell's gloomy portals;
And though he may sit in judgment strict,
He still will acquit many mortals.

And yet there are hells from out of whose clutch
There's no escape to heaven;
No prayers there avail, and powerless too
Is the Saviour's pardon even.

Is Dante's hell to thee unknown,
With its terrible trinary verses?
The man whom the poet there has shut up
Will never escape from his curses.

He ne'er will be freed from those musical flames
By any god or Saviour;
So for fear we condemn thee to such a sad hell,
Thou hadst better mind thy behaviour!





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