Variations on Heine (from Then and Now)
Deutschland. Ein Wintermarchen (II. 1-48, 77-120)
November it was. And the cloudy skies
Grew daily more down-hearted;
The wind tore at the leaves on the trees;
And off for home I started.
And as I came to German soil
My heart seemed to be drumming
Harder and faster. In fact I think
The tears had started coming.
And when I heard my native tongue
I felt so strange for a minute
I thought my blissfully bleeding heart
Would spill all that was in it.
A girl was singing to a harp.
She sang with warm emotion
And tuneless voice, but I felt played
Upon by her devotion.
She sang of love and the pain of love,
Self-sacrifice, re-union
Above the clouds in that better world
Of unsuffering communion.
She sang of this earthly vale of tears,
Of the joys we cannot capture,
Of the life to come where the soul shall feast
In eternal radiant rapture.
She sang the old Forbearance Song,
The Lullaby of Later,
Which keeps the whining lumpen poor
From turning agitator.
I know the method, I know the text,
And I know the likes of the author;
I know that they secretly tipple wine
While openly preaching water.
A new song, a better song,
Companions, I shall write you!
And here and now on earth we’ll build
A heaven to requite you.
We want our happiness here and now
On earth: we don’t want hunger.
Let lazy bellies squander the thrift
Of hard-working hands no longer!
For human kind down here below
The bread we produce is ample –
And roses and myrtles, beauty and lust,
And garden peas, for example.
Yes, garden peas for everyone!
Come pile up the pods on the barrows.
And leave the heavenly pastures to
God’s angels and the sparrows.
*
And while the maiden twittered and played
And panted after election,
The Prussian Customs Police undid
My bags for an inspection:
They poked their nose into trousers and shirts
And hankies, and fumbled for hidden
Laces and knick-knacks. And for books
Whose Knowledge was Forbidden.
O blockheads! poking in my bags
Where you won’t find a dickey,
Confiscating the contraband
Of the mind ‘s a bit more tricky!
There I have needlework finer than
Any of Brussels or Mechlin,
And once I’ve got my needles out
You won’t hear yourselves for heckling.
And I carry knick-knacks in my head,
Jewels to crown and enthrone one,
The holy gems of a future God,
Of the great, as yet Unknown One.
And in my head there are many books.
Or, more plainly stated,
My head’s a singing nest of the sort
You’d like to see confiscated.
Believe me, in Satan’s reading room
There can’t be books more stinging:
They’re twice as dicey as Hoffmann von F.’s
Unpolitical singing!
– A fellow-traveller starts to praise
But somehow in me arouses
Even more distrust of the Prussian State’s
Long chain of customs-houses.
“This customs-union,” he explains,
“Will characterize our nation –
Will help our divided Fatherland
To full Unification.
“It regulates each outward
Or material undertaking;
Whereas our spiritual unity
Is of the Censor’s making.
“He regulates each inward
Aberrance, guiding sinners.
A United Germany we need –
Without us and within us.”
Translated by W. D. Jackson
Page(s) 59-61
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