Sophocles

Many sought in vain to say the joyfullest joyfully
Here finally it speaks to me, here in grief itself declaring.

The raging poet

Fear not the poet, should he nobly rage; his letter does
Kill, but it is that spirit that can enliven spirits.


To young poets


Dear brothers! Our art perhaps is ripe,
since, like the young, it has been long fermented,
soon to the stillness of beauty;
be but glad, as was the Greek!

Love the gods and think kindly of the dead!
Hate noise, as frost! Do not teach or describe!
If the masters make you fear,
ask great nature for advice.

The lovers

We wanted to separate, supposed it good and smart;
But as we did, why did it horrify us as murder, the act?
Ah! We know ourselves little,
For in us a God prevails.

False Popularity

Oh that knower of men! He plays at childishness with children,
But the tree and the child crave what is above him.

Descriptive Poetry

Know this! Apollo is become the god of journalists
And his man is he, who tells him the fact exactly.

Half Life

With golden pears it hangs
and full of wild roses
the land into the sea,
you proud swans,
and drunk with kisses
you dunk your heads
in the sober holy water.

Woe, where shall I take,
when it is winter, the flowers,
where sunshine,
and shadows of earth?

The walls stand
Mute and cold, in the wind
The flags rattle.

Patmos

Near
God is and difficult to grasp.
But where danger is as well there grows
Salvation.
In dark they live,
the eagles, and fearlessly
the sons of the Alps go over the abyss
On bridges built lightly.
Oh, as there around
The peaks of time lay piled, and the dearest ones
Live near to us, grown weak upon
The separate mountains,
thus give us innocent waters,
Give us wings, and truest minds
To venture and return.

So speaking, then a spirit took me
faster than I could believe
from my own house farther
than I ever thought to go.
Dawning in the twilight
I went among the shadowed woods
And wistful streams of the homeland;
I never knew these lands;
But soon, in new radiance, mysterious
In the golden haze,
Grown rapidly
With the steps of the sun,
perfumed with a thousand peaks,

Asia spread before me. Dazzled I searched
For something known, for I was unused
To the broad streets, where coming down
From the Tmolus the gold-bedecked Paktolos rides
And Taurus stands and Messogis
And the garden full of flowers,
As a silent fire; but up in the light
A silver snow flourishes high;
And, as a witness of immortal life
on impenetrable walls,
the ivy grows immemorial; but they are borne
by living columns, cedars, and laurels,
the solemn,
god-built palaces.

Yet round Asia's gates there rush
here and there outstretching
in uncertain levels of the sea
enough of unshaded straits,
though a sailor knows the islands.
And since I heard
that one of them nearby
was Patmos,
I desired much
To stop there and to there
Draw near to that dark grotto.
For not as Cyprus
Rich with springs, or
any of the others, is Patmos
situated; not augustly,

But she is hospitable
in her poorer house
and if from a shipwreck or lamenting
for his homeland or
a departed friend
A stranger nears her,
she hears gladly, as do her children
The voices of the hot grove,
and where the sands blow, and the surface
of the field is cracked, these noises
Hear him and lovingly repeat
the lamentations of the man. So once she cared
For he whom god had loved,
the seer, who in a holy youth was

Bound with
the son of the highest, inseparably, for
the bearer of storms had loved the simpleness
of his disciple, and that mindful man had seen
The countenance of god directly,
Since they sat together
at the mystery of the wine, when it came
to the hour of the last supper,
And in his great soul, calmly foreseeing his own death,
The Lord spoke of that and also of his final love,
for he had never enough of words to speak
of kindness, then, and to lighten, when he saw it,
The wild rage of the world:
For all is good. Then he died. There would be
much to say of this. And they saw him as he glanced, victorious,
joyful even at the end, his friends,

But they mourned, now evening was come
in shock, for they had great ambitions in their souls,
these men, but beneath the sun they loved
their lives and did not wish to leave
the countenance of the lord
and the homeland. It drove into them
Like fire into steel, and at their side
The shadow of their beloved went.
Therefore he sent the spirit upon them
And the house did shake and the storm of God
Rolled thundering far above
their expectant heads, as they were gathered
musing heavily, these heroes set for death,

As now he came to them once more
in parting. For now died off the day of sun
majestically, the unbent radiating scepter
broken from himself, as a suffering God,
For he would come again
when the time was right. It would have been wrong
Much later, and disloyal, cutting off abruptly
his work with man, but now
it pleased him
To live in loving night, to preserve
in simple eyes steadfast
abysses of wisdom. And there also flourish
Deep in the mountains living images,

Though it is fearful how god has scattered
the living endlessly here and there.
And so it was to leave the faces
of dear friends behind and go off
into the mountains alone,
where recognized twice
the holy spirit was united; and it was not prophesied,
but grabbed then at the hair, in the moment
When hurring away
the god glanced back upon them
And vowing, so he would stop,
holding forth as if bound with golden ropes
they outstretched their hands
and called it evil–

But then when dies
who beauty most had loved,
so that a miracle was on his form
and gods had chosen him, and when
eternally they are a riddle for each other
And each cannot grasp
the other, those who live on together
in memory; and when this comes that tears away
not only sand or pastures and destroys
the temples, but when the fame
of the demigod and his disciples
disappears and even the highest
turns his countenance, so that
no immortal thing is seen in heaven or
on green earth– what then is this?

It is the toss of the winnower,
when he shovels up the wheat
and throws it to the clean air,
swinging it across the threshing floor.
Before him falls the chaff down at his feet,
but finally the kernel emerges.
It is not bad if some of it gets lost,
or of his speech the living tone then fades–
for the work of gods is much like our own,
The highest does not want all done at once.
As mineshafts bear iron
and Etna its glowing resins
so I had richness,
an image to form, alike
to look on, Christ as he was,

But if one spurred himself along
and talking sadly, on the road, assaulted me
since I was helpless, and as a servant sought
to replicate an image of the God-
once in their rage I saw them visibly
the lords of heaven, not that I would become something,
but that I would learn. The lords are kind, but what they hate the most
While they do reign, is falsehood, when there is no more
Among men what can be called humanity. For they do not preside, but what presides
is Fate undying, and its work proceeds then
Of itself, and hurries to its end.
When heavenly processions lead still higher
the strong then call him, as the sun, the exultant son of the highest,

As a watchword, and here is the staff
of song, that beckons downward,
for nothing is wicked. It awakens the dead
Who are not yet corrupted. But many
there are of shy eyes still awaiting
to see this light. They do not wish
to flourish in the sharp radiance,
for a golden bridle holds their courage back.
But when,
with eyebrows risen
forgetting of the world
A calm radiance then falls from holy scripture,
they may enjoy that grace,
and in their quiet sight may study it.

And if the gods now do,
As I believe, love me,
how much more must they You,
for one thing I know, that the will
of the eternal father
concerns you greatly.
His sign is silent
in the thundering heavens. And one stands beneath it
All his life. For Christ lives on.
But it is the heroes, they his sons
who all have come, and holy scriptures
of him, and the deeds of the earth
elucidate the lightning now
like a race unstoppable. But he is there. For his works
he has known from the beginning.

Too long, for far too long
the honor of the gods has been invisible.
For they must nearly guide
our fingers, and shamefully
A force is torn from us by the heart.
For every heavenly thing expects a sacrifice,
but if this is neglected,
it has never brought good.
We have served our mother, earth,
as well the light of sun, without awareness,
for what the father loves the most,
who reigns over all,
is that the fixed word be maintained,
that what endures be well interpreted.
So German song must follow in this way.