Some Short Poems By Goethe

The following poems are excerpts from, “The Golden Goblet: Selected Poems of Goethe” translated by Zsuzsanna Ozsvath & Frederick Turner, Deep Vellum Publishing, 2019:

Take This to Heart

Ah, what should be man’s desiring?

Better still in peace remaining?

Hanging fast and not aspiring?

Better driving, striving, straining?

Should one build a cozy dwelling?

Be a tented nomad, drifting?

Trust a rock, to keep from falling?

Even steadfast rocks are shifting.

No command is sent to all:

Let each see what he is doing,

Choose his fastness still unmoving;

And who stands, stands lest he fall.

1777

Limitation

I know not what I find so dear

In this small world so cramped and near,

What sweet enchantment binds me here;

For I forget, gladly forget

How strange that destiny should call me;

And ah! What things prepared and set

I feel within that must befall me.

O might it be that my right lot be found!

What’s still wrapped up for me must be

Fulfilled by sweet vitality,

A present silence, future hope—-to be unbound!

1815

Nature and Art

Nature and art, that seemed to flee each other,

Now find each other, ere I’d scanned the matter;

And the antipathy has vanished altogether,

And drawn to both at once, I love both better.

And after all, there’s but one true endeavor!

Only when first we bind ourselves, in hours

Of toil and soul to art, may nature ever

Kindle our heart with all its freeing powers.

Thus has all growth and learning its creation;

No spirit that’s unbound may venture ever

Upon the purest, highest consummation.

Who seeks the great must grid himself together,

Showing his mastery in limitation,

And only law can set us free forever.

1802