an experiment

The following was an experiment/mash-up using the very, very strange and wonderful poetry of Friedrich Hölderlin, including some of the original German.  All of the words are Hölderlin's, or from the English translation by Michael Hamburger.


Fragments of the Fragments of the Later Version of Patmos, by Friedrich Hölderlin

Voll Güt' ist; keiner aber fasset
Allein Gott.

Most kind is; but no one by himself
Can grasp God.

In gloomy places dwell
The eagles, over
The chasm walk the sons
On bridges lightly built.
Give us innocent water,
O pinions give us, with minds
To cross over and to return.

So I spoke when
a Genius carried me
From my own house. There clothed themselves,
Like men,
The shadowy wood
homeland;
So, fresh,
golden haze
Quickly
fragrant,

Now, Asia burst into flower for me,
drowsy almost with flowers the garden,

O Insel des Lichts!
land of eyes,
More athletic
In ruin.
The hand of the Lord.
Rein aber bestand
Auf ungebundnem Boden Johannes.

von Cana.
A little while I shall stay, he said.
the Baptist's head,
Just picked, like script
on the platter. Like fire
Are voices of God. Yet it is hard
In great events to preserve what is great.

Johannes. Christus.
But that's
Impossible.
And now
I wish to sing.
Werden Träume. Fall on the heart
Like error, and killing, if one does not

Consider what they are and understand.
the Lord
Pronounced death, for never
He could find words enough
To say about kindness. Sein Licht war

Tod.
Alles ist gut. Thereupon he died.
as when
A century bends, thoughtfully.

The evening had come. For to
Be pure is a skill.
But much is to be avoided. Too much
Of love
Is dangerous.
und der Heimath.
beside them
Walked, like a plague, the loved one's shadow.
mightily trembled
The house and God's thunder-storms rolled
Distantly rumbling,