"Winter Journey in the Harz": A Poem by Goethe

"Winter journey in the Harz 2" ; Ernst Barlach, 1924

Rainer Maria Rilke

To N. N.

February 8, 1912

"Now it my turn thank you (...) But listen to what I am thanking you for, and tell me yourself whether one may be sparing of thanks there — for the Harz Journey in Winter.

Not the Brahms version (I know almost no music) but for the Goethe poem, which is pure splendor. Most learned girl, still growing in wisdom every day, what will you think of me when you read that I did not know until last evening these great verses of antique moderation (for else they would withdraw from us into excess) ? In your letter I found the one very beautiful passage quoted, that made me curious , that is how I came upon them. Thank you.

I must tell you that only now for the first time, little by little and with all sorts of precautions, I am acquiring admiration for Goethe which, indeed as it comes to focus, is at once the greatest too, the most unqualified. Until a short while ago I knew only very little of his work, my need never turned instinctively to him, the great is both more accessible and more kindly disposed toward me at other high places ; but this Harz Journey I henceforth count among the strongest and purest, it is one of the most authentic poems: what harm could any time do it ?"

— Rainer Maria Rilke

  As the hawk aloft
  On heavy daybreak cloud
  Searching for prey,
  May my song hover.
 
  For a god has
  duly to each
  His path prefixed,
  And the fortunate man
  Runs fast and joyfully
  To his journey's end;
  But he whose heart
  Misfortune constricted
  Struggles in vain
  To break from the bonds
  Of the brazen thread
  Which the shears, so bitter still,
  Cut once alone.
 
  Into grisly thickets
  The rough beasts run,
  And with the sparrows
  The rich long since have
  Sunk in their swamps.
 
  Easy it is to follow that car
  Which Fortune steers,
  Like the leisurely troop that rides
  The find highroads
  Behind the array of the Prince.
 
  But who is it stands aloof ?
  His path is lost in the brake,
  Behind hime the shrubs
  Close and he's gone,
  Grass grows straight again,
  The emptiness swallows him.
 
  O who shall heal his agony then
  In whom each balm turned poison,
  Who drank hatred of man
  From the very fullness of love ?
  First held now holding in contempt,
  In secret he consumes
  His own particular good
  In selfhood unsated.
 
  If in your book of songs
  Father of love, there sounds
  One note his ear can hear,
  Refresh with it then his heart !
  Open his clouded gaze
  To the thousand fountainheads
  About him as he thirsts
  In the desert !
 
  You who give joys that are manifold,
  To each his overflowing share,
  Bless the companions that hunt
  On the spoor of the beasts
  With young exuberance
  Of glad desire to kill,
  Tardy avengers of outrage
  For so long repelled in vain
  By the cudgeling countryman.
 
  But hide the solitary man
  In your sheer gold cloud !
  Till roses flower again
  Surround with winter-green
  The moistened hair,
  O love, of your poet !
 
  With your lantern glowing
  You light his way
  Over the fords by night,
  On impassable tracks
  Through the void countryside;
  With daybreak thousand-hued
  Into his heart you laugh;
  With the mordant storm
  You bear him aloft;
  Winter streams plunge from the crag
  Into his songs,
  And his altar of sweetest thanks
 
  Is the snow-hung brow
  Of the terrible peak
  People in their imaginings crowned
  With spirit dances.
 
  You stand with heart unplumbed
  Mysteriously revealed
  Above the marveling world
  And you look from clouds
  On the kingdoms and magnificence
  Which from your brothers' veins beside you
  With streams you water.
 

  — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

 Source:

"Selected Poems" ; "Harzreise im Winter" (1777)

"A Winter Journey in the Harz", Translated by Christopher Middleton