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All the Fruit...

Friedrich Holderlin, Friedrich Holderlin poetry, Secular or Eclectic, Secular or Eclectic poetry, Romantic poetry, [TRADITION SUB2] poetry, Christian poetry by Friedrich Holderlin
(1770 - 1843) Timeline

English version by
Robert Bly

Original Language
German

Secular or Eclectic : Romantic
Christian : Protestant
19th Century

All the fruit is ripe, plunged in fire, cooked,
And they have passed their test on earth, and one law is this:
That everything curls inward, like snakes,
Prophetic, dreaming on
The hills of heaven. And many things
Have to stay on the shoulders like a load
of failure. However the roads
Are bad. For the chained elements,
Like horses, are going off to the side,
And the old
Laws of the earth. And a longing
For disintegration constantly comes. Many things however
Have to stay on the shoulders. Steadiness is essential.
Forwards, however, or backwards we will
Not look. Let us learn to live swaying
As in a rocking boat on the sea.

 

1803

 

-- from News of the Universe: Poems of Twofold Consciousness, Edited by Robert Bly

Amazon.com

 

Themes

  Dream
  Fire
  Garden
  Mountain
  Sleep


Recommended Books


Elucidations of Holderlin's Poetry: (Contemporary Studies in Philosophy and the Human Sciences), by Martin Heidegger
Holderlin: Selected Poems and Fragments, by Friedrich Holderlin / Translated by Michael Hamburger
Hymns and Fragments, by Friedrich Holderlin / Translated by Richard Sieburth
Hyperion and Selected Poems: (German Library), by Friedrich Holderlin
Music of the Sky: An Anthology of Spiritual Poetry, Edited by Patrick Laude / Edited by Barry McDonald

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Ivan M. Granger's original poetry, stories and commentaries are Copyright © 2002 - 2011 by Ivan M. Granger.
All other material is copyrighted by the respective authors, translators and/or publishers.