Silence (Georg Trakl)

Over the forests the moon

Gleams pale, makes us dream,

The willow by the dark pond

Weeps soundlessly in the night.

A heart extinguishes – and placidly

The fogs flood and rise –

Silence, silence!

Oak Tree House Llyn Dryw Bach aka the Pond.

Closing Chord (Georg Trakl)

The last, pale light went from the day,
The early passions have rustled down,
The holy wine of my joys spilled
Now my heart weeps in the night and listens

After the echo of its young celebrations,
Which trails off so placidly in the dark,
So shadowy, like wilted leaves falling
On an abandoned grave in autumn night.

From the Still Days (Georg Trakl)

So ghostly are these late days

Just like the look of sick people, sent here

In the light. However, the night shades the muted lament

Of their eyes, toward which they already turn.

They probably smile and recall their celebrations,

How one is moved after songs, half forgotten,

And searches words for a sad gesture,

Which already grows pale in silence unmeasured.

So the sun still plays around ill flowers

And lets them shiver in the thin, clear airs

With a death-cool delight.

The red forests whisper and darken,

And more death-nightly the woodpeckers’ hammering echoes

Just like a reverberation from airless crypts.

I saw many towns as if robbed by flame

And the times accumulated atrocity after atrocity,

And saw a lot of people putrefy to dust,

And everything float into oblivion.

I saw the gods fall to the night,

The holiest harps powerlessly smashed,

And kindled anew from putrefaction,

A new life swelling to the day.

Swelling to the day and again passing,

The eternally identical tragedy,

That thus we play without understanding,

And its insanity’s nightly torture

Wreathes the soft glory of beauty

Like a smiling universe of thorns.

(#3 From Georg Trakl’s Three Dreams )

I think, I dreamed of falling leaves,

Of wide forests and dark lakes,

Of sad words’ echo –

However, I could not understand their meaning.

I think, I dreamed of falling stars,

Of the weeping entreaty of pale eyes,

Of a smile’s echo –

However, I could not understand its meaning.

Like falling leaves, like falling stars,

So I saw myself eternally coming and going,

A dream’s immortal echo –

However, I could not understand its meaning. (Georg Trakl).