What a beautiful story, really, and a beautiful poem. Thank you so much for sharing! What a lucky old man that was! :) Also, wish I could read Nietzsche and Goethe in the original, haha! Hope life's been treating you kind.
Thank you :).
I need a special mood for that kind of poems. The world outside is so loud and fast that I needed a quiet moment for that written magic.
No, most of the world is just cruel and I am working on it to may leave it soon. But that's not a topic for this part of the forum :).
Oh my, no thank you! That was a beautiful story, so bittersweet :') They seem to have so much love and compassion, until the very end despite it all. They were rich in that sense.
The poem is beautiful, the translation makes sense to me, and i've heard German is difficult to script properly. I'll remember to look up Nietzsche, I completely forgot he wrote poetry!
I'm happy my threat made you reflect back on this memory :)
Don't be sorry aha, I love long ass replies !
Thank you :).
Yes it is bittersweet. In the moment when it happend I felt like some kind of Voyeur but it was sommer and we had no chance change the situation. So I just keept quiet and soaked up the whole situation.
Oh yeah they were rich in that sense but I think the old pal had not much time anymore and his wife wanted to reach his slowly decreasing soul behind the wind of oblivion. Maybe she just wanted to touch him in his heart one last time. How knows...
You are right, german can be difficult even for germans :D. But that difficulty can help express yourself if you can use the possible ways. Most of the people don't do it that way. I like the old style and trying to use with "modern" german but not everyone can understand it or is thinking you are expressing yourself incorrectly.
An slightly older pal of mine was born in spain. His parents moved to germany when he was around 14. He can speak much more detailled german than most of the other guys I know.
He told me I should keep the way I speak :).
Oh and ginko0 mentioned Hermann Hesse. If you can get a really good translation you will have a feeling of watched an whole movie after two sides of his books :). Well not everyone likes it that way. Hesse was a very modern writer for his time. It was important in his family that there is more than just germany and that you can feel it in his books.
I have another translation here. In some parts it makes more sense and yet it's diffcult to transfer some of the old german words/rhetoric into english.
Is it possible, star of stars,
That, once more, I press you to my heart!
Oh! What pain has our night apart
Brought in its abyss!
Yes! It is you and of my joys
The sweet and dearest counterpart;
But mindful of those sorrows past,
I tremble at the present.
When the world in formless being
Lay in God's eternal breast,
He ordained with sublime desire
That first hour of His creation;
And he spoke the words: 'Let there be'
Whereon resounded a piercing cry
As the universe with mighty thrust
Became reality.
Responding to command, the light
Tore darkness fearfully away
As, at once, the elements
Flew apart from one another.
Quickly, in wild and furious dreams
Each one fled afar,
Bleakly, in unmeasured space,
Soundlessly, without a care.
All was dumb and silent waste
As God first stood alone!
Therefore, He created morning dawn,
And anguish faded in its mercy;
It developed from the gloom
A striking play of colour
Investing, now, with love again
That which to contention fell;
Then sought, with hurried striving,
All that belonged together
Thus, returning to unbounded life
The sense of sight and feeling.
However seized, however grasped,
May it stay firm and hold secure.
Allah need create no more
When we can build upon his world.
Just so, those wings of morning dawn
Have drawn me to your mouth,
And star-bright night with a thousand seals
Has strengthened our bond with light.
We are both, upon the earth,
Paragons of joy and grief alike
And a second word: 'Let there be'
Will part us not a second time.
