On the Marshy Pastures
A man who walks in the black wind; the dry reeds
rustle quietly
Through the silence of the marshy pastures. In
the grey skies
A migration of wild birds move in ranks
Catty-corner over dark waters.
Insurgence. In the collapsing houses
Decay is fluttering out with black wings;
Crippled-up birches breathe heavily in the wind.
Evening in empty roadhouses. The longing for home
settles about
The delicate despair of the grazing flocks,
Vision of the night: toads plunge from silver waters.
poem by Georg Trakl
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Gipsy
The longing flames in their nightly glance
Toward that homeland they never find.
So they drift in an unfortunate fate,
That only melancholy may fathom completely.
The clouds lead their ways,
A migration of birds may sometimes escort them,
Until it loses their track in the evening,
And the wind sometimes carries an Ave of bells
In their camp's star-loneliness,
So that their songs swell more longing
And sob from inherited curse and suffering,
That no stars of hope softly illuminate.
poem by Georg Trakl
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Exhausting
Putrefaction of dream-created paradises
Blows around this mourning-filled, tired heart,
That drank only disgust out of all sweetness,
And bleeds to death in vulgar pain.
Now it beats after the rhythm of faded dances
To the cloudy melodies of despair,
Meanwhile the star-crowns of old hope
Wither on the long ago godless altar.
From the drunkenness of fragrances and wines
An extreme awake feeling of shame remained with you -
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poem by Georg Trakl
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Summer Sonata
Rotten fruits smell stunning.
Bushes and trees sound sunnily,
Swarms of black flies sing
On the brown forest glade.
In the pool's deep blueness
The light of weed-fires blazes.
Hear sudden love cries whirring
From yellow flower walls.
Butterflies chase themselves for a long time;
Drunkenly my shadow dances
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poem by Georg Trakl
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On the Edge of an Old Well
Dark interpretation of the water: broken forehead in the mouth of the night,
The boy's bluish shadow sighing in black pillows,
The rustling of the maple, steps in the old park,
Chamber concerts which fade on a spiral staircase,
Perhaps a moon which quietly climbs the steps.
The gentle voices of the nuns in the decayed church,
A blue tabernacle which slowly opens,
Stars which fall on your bony hands,
Perhaps a walk through abandoned rooms,
The blue tone of the flute in the hazel bushes - very quietly.
poem by Georg Trakl
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Winter Walk in A-Minor
Red spheres often emerge from branches,
Snowed under softly and black by a long snowfall.
The priest escorts the dead person.
The nights are fulfilled by celebrations of masks.
Then tousled crows glide over the village;
In books fairy tales are written miraculously.
At the window an old man's hair flutters.
Demons go through the ill soul.
The well freezes in the courtyard. Decayed stairs fall
In the darkness and a wind blows
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poem by Georg Trakl
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Hour of Grief
Blackish the step follows the gleaming moon
In the autumnal garden,
The immense night sinks by the freezing wall.
O, the thorny hour of grief.
Silverly the candlestick of the lonely one flickers in the dusking room,
Dying away, when that one thinks a darkness
And bends the stony head over the perishable,
Drunk from wine and nightly harmonies.
The ear always follows
The soft lament of the blackbird in the hazel bushes.
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poem by Georg Trakl
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At Night
The blueness dies out in my eyes tonight,
the red gold of my heart. O how still the light burns!
Your cloak of sadness encircles the long descent.
Your red lips seal your friend’s unhinging.
Translated by Eric Plattner
……………………………………………………………………
Nachts
Die Bläue meiner Augen ist erloschen in dieser Nacht,
Das rote Gold meines Herzens. O! wie stille brannte das Licht.
Dein blauer Mantel umfing den Sinkenden;
Dein roter Mund besiegelte des Freundes Umnachtung.
poem by Georg Trakl
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The Saint
When in the hell of self-created sufferings
Cruelly indecent pictures plague him -
No heart was ever so enchanted by lascivious prurience
Like his, and no heart so tormented
By God - he lifts gaunt hands,
Unredeemed, praying to heaven.
But, only agonizingly insatiable lust forms
His rutting, feverish prayer, its fervor
Surges there through mystical infinities.
And not so drunkenly the Evoe
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poem by Georg Trakl
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To The Silenced
Oh, the great city's madness when at nightfall
The crippled trees gape by the blackened wall,
The spirit of evil peers from a silver mask;
Lights with magnetic scourge drive off the stony night.
Oh, the sunken pealing of evening bells.
Whore who in her icy shivers sheds a still-born child.
With raving whips God's fury punishes brows possessed.
Purple pestilence, hunger that breaks green eyes.
Oh, the horrible laughter of gold.
But silent in dark caves a stiller humanity bleeds,
Out of hard metals moulds the redeeming head.
poem by Georg Trakl
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