Читать книгу The Greatest German Classics (Vol. 1-14) - Various - Страница 1609

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[There is peace between the Greeks and Trojans—Achilles is to wed Polyxena, Priam's daughter. On entering the Temple, he is shot through his only vulnerable part by Paris.—The time of the following Poem is during the joyous preparations for the marriage.]

And mirth was in the halls of Troy,

Before her towers and temples fell;

High peal'd the choral hymns of joy,

Melodious to the golden shell.

The weary had reposed from slaughter—

The eye forgot the tear it shed;

This day King Priam's lovely daughter

Shall great Pelides wed!

Adorn'd with laurel boughs, they come,

Crowd after crowd—the way divine,

Where fanes are deck'd—for gods the home—

And to the Thymbrian's[17] solemn shrine.

The wild Bacchantic joy is madd'ning

The thoughtless host, the fearless guest;

And there, the unheeded heart is sadd'ning

One solitary breast!

Unjoyous in the joyful throng,

Alone, and linking life with none,

Apollo's laurel groves among

The still Cassandra wander'd on!

Into the forest's deep recesses

The solemn Prophet-Maiden pass'd,

And, scornful, from her loosen'd tresses,

The sacred fillet cast!

"To all its arms doth Mirth unfold,

And every heart foregoes its cares;

And Hope is busy in the old;

The bridal-robe my sister wears.

But I alone, alone am weeping;

The sweet delusion mocks not me—

Around these walls destruction sweeping

More near and near I see!

"A torch before my vision glows,

But not in Hymen's hand it shines;

A flame that to the welkin goes,

But not from holy offering-shrines;

Glad hands the banquet are preparing,

And near, and near the halls of state

I hear the God that comes unsparing;

I hear the steps of Fate.

"And men my prophet-wail deride!

The solemn sorrow dies in scorn;

And lonely in the waste, I hide

The tortured heart that would forewarn.

Amidst the happy, unregarded,

Mock'd by their fearful joy, I trod;

Oh, dark to me the lot awarded,

Thou evil Pythian god!

"Thine oracle, in vain to be,

Oh, wherefore am I thus consign'd

With eyes that every truth must see,

Lone in the City of the Blind?

Cursed with the anguish of a power

To view the fates I may not thrall,

The hovering tempest still must lower—

The horror must befall!

"Boots it the veil to lift, and give

To sight the frowning fates beneath?

For error is the life we live,

And, oh, our knowledge is but death!

Take back the clear and awful mirror,

Shut from mine eyes the blood-red glare

Thy truth is but a gift of terror

When mortal lips declare.

"My blindness give to me once more[18]—

The gay dim senses that rejoice;

The Past's delighted songs are o'er

For lips that speak a Prophet's voice.

To me the future thou hast granted; I miss the moment from the chain— The happy Present-Hour enchanted! Take back thy gift again!

"Never for me the nuptial wreath

The odor-breathing hair shall twine;

My heavy heart is bow'd beneath

The service of thy dreary shrine.

My youth was but by tears corroded—

My sole familiar is my pain,

Each coming ill my heart foreboded,

And felt it first—in vain!

"How cheer'ly sports the careless mirth—

The life that loves, around I see;

Fair youth to pleasant thoughts give birth—

The heart is only sad to me.

Not for mine eyes the young spring gloweth,

When earth her happy feast-day keeps;

The charm of life who ever knoweth

That looks into the deeps?

"Wrapt in thy bliss, my sister, thine

The heart's inebriate rapture-springs;—

Longing with bridal arms to twine

The bravest of the Grecian kings.

High swells the joyous bosom, seeming

Too narrow for its world of love,

Nor envies, in its heaven of dreaming,

The heaven of gods above!

"I too might know the soft control

Of one the longing heart could choose,

With look which love illumes with soul—

The look that supplicates and woos.

And sweet with him, where love presiding

Prepares our hearth, to go—but, dim,

A Stygian shadow, nightly gliding,

Stalks between me and him!

"Forth from the grim funereal shore,

The Hell-Queen sends her ghastly bands;

Where'er I turn—behind—before—

Dumb in my path—a Spectre stands!

Wherever gayliest, youth assembles—

I see the shades in horror clad,

Amidst Hell's ghastly People trembles

One soul for ever sad!

"I see the steel of Murder gleam—

I see the Murderer's glowing eyes—

To right—to left, one gory stream—

One circling fate—my flight defies!

I may not turn my gaze—all seeing,

Foreknowing all, I dumbly stand—

To close in blood my ghastly being

In the far strangers' land!"

Hark! while the sad sounds murmur round,

Hark, from the Temple-porch, the cries!—

A wild, confused, tumultuous sound!—

Dead the divine Pelides lies!

Grim Discord rears her snakes devouring—

The last departing god hath gone!

And, womb'd in cloud, the thunder, lowering,

Hangs black on Ilion.

[Illustration: CASSANDRA Ferdinand Keller]

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