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    AC Benus
  • AC Benus
  • Author
  • 06/03/2023
  • 256 Words
  • 483 Views
  • 4 Comments
Poetry posted in this category are works of fiction. Names, places, characters, events, and incidents are created by the authors' imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to actual persons (living or dead), organizations, companies, events, or locales are entirely coincidental.
Note: While authors are asked to place warnings on their stories for some moderated content, everyone has different thresholds, and it is your responsibility as a reader to avoid stories or stop reading if something bothers you. 

Translation Trashbin - 46. When that stroke leaves you to die in agony

.

an Hermann von Rotenhan

 

Ist das ein GlĂŒck, daß du beglĂŒckt gewesen,

Wenn du dahinstirbst in unsel’gen Qualen?
Wenn jahrelange Hölle muß bezahlen
FĂŒr eine Stunde, mir zum Heil erlesen?


 

O komm, o komm! du schönstes aller Wesen,
Mit Augen, leuchtend in der Liebe Strahlen,
Mit Lippen, welche Treue mir befahlen,
O komm! Doch nicht damit ich soll genesen.

 

Denn bis du nahest dem, der dies geschrieben,
Hat er, der Sehnsucht Raub, bereits genossen
Den Bodensatz im Lebenskelch voll Wermut.

 

Doch komm, und finge denen, die dich lieben,
Die Lieder nur, in denen sich ergossen
Durch lange, bange NĂ€chte seine Schwermut.

—August von Platen,

20. Dezember 1820

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

to Hermann von Rotenhan

 
Is it fortunate that you've been made lucky
When that stroke leaves you to die in agony?
When years of hell are deemed a recompense fair
For a single hour of my salvation?
 
Then come, oh come, you most beautiful of forms,
With shining eyes lighted by the rays of love,
With lips pledging fidelity unto me,
Then come, but do it more for your sake than mine.
 
For should a time come you'd approach he who wrote this,
Know he's, beggared of longing, already drained
The bitterest dregs in life's cup of wormwood.
 
But if come, you'd find these words of love for thee,
The songs in which, through the long nights, he's distilled
The melancholy root of his anxiety.

—August von Platen,

December 20th, 1820

 

 

 

 

 

_

Copyright © 2018 AC Benus; All Rights Reserved.
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Poetry posted in this category are works of fiction. Names, places, characters, events, and incidents are created by the authors' imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to actual persons (living or dead), organizations, companies, events, or locales are entirely coincidental.
Note: While authors are asked to place warnings on their stories for some moderated content, everyone has different thresholds, and it is your responsibility as a reader to avoid stories or stop reading if something bothers you. 
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