TO LUNA
by: Johann Wolfgang von
Goethe
- ISTER of
the earliest light,
- Type of loveliness in sorrow,
- Silver mists thy radiance borrow,
- Even as they cross thy sight.
- When thou comest to the sky,
- In their dusky hollows waken,
- Spirits that are sad, forsaken,
- Birds that shun the day, and I.
-
- Looking downward far and wide,
- Hidden things thou dost discover.
- Luna! help a hapless lover,
- Lift him kindly to thy side!
- Aided by thy friendly beams,
- Let him through the lattice peeping,
- Look into the room where, sleeping,
- Lies the maiden of his dreams.
-
- Ah, I see her! Now I gaze,
- Bending in a trance Elysian,
- And I strain my inmost vision,
- And I gather all thy rays.
- Bright and brighter yet I see
- Charms no envious robes encumber;
- And she draws me to her slumber
- As Endymion once drew thee.
John Storer Cobb's English translation
of 'To Luna' was first published in Goethe: Poetical Works,
vol. 1. Boston: Francis A Niccolls & Company, 1902. |
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