Poems and Ballads of Heinrich Heine Part 23

SECOND CYCLUS.

Motto, Xenophon's Anabasis--IV. V.

I. SALUTATION TO THE SEA.

Thalatta! Thalatta!

All hail to thee, thou Eternal sea!

All hail to thee ten thousand times From my jubilant heart, As once thou wast hailed By ten thousand Grecian hearts, Misfortune-combating, homeward-yearning, World-renowned Grecian hearts.

The waters heaved, They heaved and roared.

The sun poured streaming downward Its flickering rosy lights.

The startled flocks of sea-mews Fluttered away with shrill screams; The coursers stamped, the shields rattled, And far out, resounded like a triumphal paean, Thalatta! Thalatta!

All hail to thee, thou Eternal Sea!

Like the language of home, thy water whispers to me.

Like the dreams of my childhood I see it glimmer.

Over thy billowy realm of waves.

And it repeats to me anew olden memories, Of all the beloved glorious sports, Of all the twinkling Christmas gifts, Of all the ruddy coral-trees, Tiny golden fishes, pearls and bright-hued mussels, Which thou dost secretly preserve Below there in thy limpid house of crystal.

Oh, how I have pined in barren exile!

Like a withered flower In the tin box of a botanist, My heart lay in my breast.

I feel as if all winter I had sat, A sick man, in a dark, sick room, Which now I suddenly leave.

And dazzlingly shines down upon me The emerald spring, the sunshine-awakened spring, And the white-blossomed trees are rustling; And the young flowers look at me, With their many-colored, fragrant eyes.

And there is an aroma, and a murmuring, and a breathing and a laughter, And in the blue sky the little birds are singing, Thalatta! Thalatta!

Thou valiant, retreating heart, How oft, how bitter oft Did the fair barbarians of the North press thee hard!

From their large victorious eyes They darted burning shafts.

With crooked, polished words, They threatened to cleave my breast.

With sharp-pointed missives they shattered My poor, stunned brain.

In vain I held up against them my shield, The arrows whizzed, the strokes cracked, And from the fair barbarians of the North I was pressed even unto the sea.

And now with deep, free breath, I hail the sea, The dear, redeeming sea-- Thalatta! Thalatta!

II. TEMPEST.

Gloomy lowers the tempest over the sea, And through the black wall of cloud Is unsheathed the jagged lightning, Swift outflashing, and swift-vanishing, Like a jest from the brain of Chronos.

Over the barren, billowy water, Far away rolls the thunder, And up leap the white water-steeds, Which Boreas himself begot Out of the graceful mare of Erichthon, And the sea-birds flutter around, Like the shadowy dead on the Styx, Whom Charon repels from his nocturnal boat.

Poor, merry, little vessel, Dancing yonder the most wretched of dances!

Eolus sends it his liveliest comrades, Who wildly play to the jolliest measures; One pipes his horn, another blows, A third sc.r.a.pes his growling ba.s.s-viol.

And the uncertain sailor stands at the rudder, And constantly gazes at the compa.s.s, The trembling soul of the ship; And he raises his hands in supplication to Heaven-- "Oh, save me, Castor, gigantic hero!

And thou conquering wrestler, Pollux."

III. WRECKED.

Hope and love! everything shattered And I myself, like a corpse That the growling sea has cast up, I lie on the strand, On the barren cold strand.

Before me surges the waste of waters, Behind me lies naught but grief and misery; And above me, march the clouds,-- The formless, gray daughters of the air, Who from the sea, in buckets of mist, Draw the water, And laboriously drag and drag it, And spill it again in the sea-- A melancholy, tedious task, And useless as my own life.

The waves murmur, the sea mews scream, Old recollections possess me; Forgotten dreams, banished visions, Tormentingly sweet, uprise.

There lives a woman in the North, A beautiful woman, royally beautiful.

Her slender, cypress-like form Is swathed in a light, white raiment.

Her locks, in their dusky fullness, Like a blessed night, Streaming from her braid-crowned head, Curl softly as a dream Around the sweet, pale face; And from the sweet pale face Large and powerful beams an eye, Like a black sun.

Oh thou black sun, how oft, How rapturously oft, I drank from thee The wild flames of inspiration!

And stood and reeled, intoxicated with fire.

Then there hovered a smile as mild as a dove, About the arched, haughty lips.

And the arched, haughty lips Breathed forth words as sweet as moonlight, And delicate as the fragrance of the rose.

And my soul soared aloft, And flew like an eagle up into the heavens.

Silence ye waves and sea mews!

All is over! joy and hope-- Hope and love! I lie on the ground An empty, shipwrecked man, And press my glowing face Into the moist sand.

IV. SUNSET.

The beautiful sun Has quietly descended into the sea.

The surging water is already tinted By dusky night-- But still the red of evening Sprinkles it with golden lights.

And the rushing might of the tide Presses toward the sh.o.r.e the white waves, That merrily and nimbly leap Like woolly flocks of sheep, Which at evening the singing shepherd boy Drives homeward.

"How beautiful is the sun!"

Thus spake after a long silence, the friend Who wandered with me on the beach.

And, half in jest, half in sober sadness, He a.s.sured me that the sun Was a beautiful woman, who had for policy Espoused the old G.o.d of the sea.

All day she wanders joyously In the lofty heavens, decked with purple, And sparkling with diamonds; Universally beloved, universally admired By all creatures of the globe, And cheering all creatures of the globe With the radiance and warmth of her glance.

But at evening, wretchedly constrained, She returns once more To the wet home, to the empty arms Of her h.o.a.ry spouse.

"Believe me," added my friend, And laughed and sighed, and laughed again, "They live down there in the daintiest wedlock; Either they sleep or else they quarrel, Until high upheaves the sea above them, And the sailor amidst the roaring of the waves can hear How the old fellow berates his wife: 'Round strumpet of the universe!

Sunbeam coquette!

The whole day you shine for others, And at night for me you are frosty and tired.'

After such curtain lectures,-- Quite naturally--bursts into tears The proud sun, and bemoans her misery, And bemoans so lamentably long, that the sea G.o.d Suddenly springs desperately out of his bed, And quickly swims up to the surface of the ocean, To collect his wits and to breathe."

Thus did I myself see him yester-night, Uprise from the bosom of the sea.

He had a jacket of yellow flannel, And a lily-white night cap, And a withered countenance.

V. THE SONG OF THE OCEANIDES.

'Tis nightfall and paler grows the sea.

And alone with his lonely soul, There sits a man on the cold strand And turns his death-cold glances Towards the vast, death-cold vault of heaven, And toward the vast, billowy sea.

On airy sails float forth his sighs; And melancholy they return, And find the heart close-locked, Wherein they fain would anchor.

And he groans so loud that the white sea-mews, Startled out of their sandy nests, Flutter circling around him.

And he laughingly speaks to them thus:

"Ye black-legged birds, With white wings, oversea flutterers!