Three Dreams
Georg Trakl 1887 (Salzburg) – 1914 (Kraków)
I
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.
II
In my soul's dark mirror
Are pictures of never-seen seas,
Of abandoned, tragic imaginary lands,
Dissolving into the blue, the thereabouts.
My soul bore blood-purple skies
Shone through by gigantic, crackling suns,
And strangely animated, shimmering gardens,
That steamed with muggy, deadly delights.
And my soul's dark fountain
Created pictures of immense nights,
Moved by nameless cantos
And breaths of eternal powers.
My soul shudders memory-dark,
As if it found itself in everything -
In unfathomable seas and nights,
And deep cantos, without beginning and end.
III
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.
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:18 min read
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Quick analysis:
Scheme | a x b c d e b C d c b C f x x x e g g h i h a x x c h x x j x i x x i x c j c f j x |
---|---|
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,499 |
Words | 257 |
Stanzas | 42 |
Stanza Lengths | 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1 |
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"Three Dreams" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/14793/three-dreams>.
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