The Poems of Goethe Part 123

Born for each other are Medschnun and Lily; Loving, though old and grey, Dschemil saw Boteinah.

Love's sweet caprice anon, Brown maid + and Solomon!

If thou dost mark them well, Stronger thy love will swell.

1817.*

(+ Brown maid is the Queen of Sheba.) ----- ONE PAIR MORE.

LOVE is indeed a glorious prize!

What fairer guerdon meets our eyes?-- Though neither wealth nor power are thine, A very hero thou dost s.h.i.+ne.

As of the prophet, they will tell, Wamik and Asia's tale as well.-- They'll tell not of them,--they'll but give Their names, which now are all that live.

The deeds they did, the toils they proved No mortal knows! But that they loved This know we. Here's the story true Of Wamik and of Asia too.

1827.*

----- LOVE's torments sought a place of rest,

Where all might drear and lonely be; They found ere long my desert breast,

And nestled in its vacancy.

1827.*

----- IV. TEFKIR NAME.

BOOK OF CONTEMPLATION.

FIVE THINGS.

WHAT makes time short to me?

Activity!

What makes it long and spiritless?

'Tis idleness!

What brings us to debt?

To delay and forget!

What makes us succeed?

Decision with speed How to fame to ascend?

Oneself to defend!

1814 ----- FOR woman due allowance make!

Form'd of a crooked rib was she,--

By Heaven she could not straightened be.

Attempt to bend her, and she'll break; If left alone, more crooked grows madam; What well could be worse, my good friend, Adam?-- For woman due allowance make; 'Twere grievous, if thy rib should break!

1819.*

----- FIRDUSI (Speaks).

OH world, with what baseness and guilt thou art rife!

Thou nurtures, trainest, and illest the while.

He only whom Allah doth bless with his smile Is train'd and is nurtured with riches and life.

1819.*

----- SULEIKA (Speaks).

THE mirror tells me, I am fair!

Thou sayest, to grow old my fate will be.

Nought in G.o.d's presence changeth e'er,--

Love him, for this one moment, then, in me.

1819.*

----- V. RENDSCH NAME

BOOK OF GLOOM.

IT is a fault oneself to praise,

And yet 'tis done by each whose deeds are kind; And if there's no deceit in what he says,

The good we still as good shall find.

Let, then, ye fools, that wise man taste

Of joy, who fancies that he s wise, That he, a fool like you, may waste

Th' insipid thanks the world supplies.

1816.

----- VI. HIKMET NAME.

BOOK OF PROVERBS.

CALL on the present day and night for nought, Save what by yesterday was brought.

----- THE sea is flowing ever, The land retains it never.

----- BE stirring, man, while yet the day is clear; The night when none can work fast Draweth near.

----- WHEN the heavy-laden sigh, Deeming help and hope gone by, Oft, with healing power is heard, Comfort-fraught, a kindly word.

----- How vast is mine inheritance, how glorious and sublime!

For time mine own possession is, the land I till is time!

----- UNWARY saith,--ne'er lived a man more true; The deepest heart, the highest head he knew,-- "In ev'ry place and time thou'lt find availing Uprightness, judgment, kindliness unfailing."

----- THOUGH the bards whom the Orient sun bath bless'd Are greater than we who dwell in the west, Yet in hatred of those whom our equals we find.

In this we're not in the least behind.