Albert Ehrenstein

From “Modern German Poems”
Translated by Babette Deutsch and Avrahm Yarmolinsky

I SANG the songs of red revenge,

And I sang the stillness of wood-shadowed waters.

But no one companioned me—

Rigid, lonely,

As the locust sings to itself,

To myself I sang my song.

Now my steps vanish, grown faint

In the sands of lassitude.

For weariness my eyes are failing me,

I am tired of comfortless fords,

Of sea-crossing, of girls, of streets;

At the gulf’s edge I do not remember

The shields and the spears.

Blown upon by birches,

By winds overshadowed,

I fall asleep to the sound of a harp

Whose music

Joyfully drips from under another’s fingers.

I do not stir,

For all thoughts and all acts

Trouble the limpid eyes of the world.