Heine’s Grave

“Henri Heine”--’tis here!The black tombstone, the nameCarved there--no more; and the smooth,Swarded alleys, the limesTouched with yellow by hotSummer, but under them still,In September’s bright afternoon,Shadow, and verdure, and cool.Trim Montmartre! the faintMurmur of Paris outside;Crisp everlasting-flowers,Yellow and black, on the graves.

Half blind, palsied, in pain,Hither to come, from the streets’Uproar, surely not loathWast thou, Heine! to lieQuiet, to ask for closedShutters, and darkened room,And cool drinks, and an easedPosture, and opium, no more;Hither to come, and to sleepUnder the wings of Renown.

Ah! not little, when painIs most quelling, and manEasily quelled, and the fineTemper of genius so soonThrills at each smart, is the praise,Not to have yielded to pain!No small boast, for a weakSon of mankind, to the earthPinned by the thunder, to rearHis bolt-scathed front to the stars;And, undaunted, retort’Gainst thick-crashing, insane,Tyrannous tempests of bale,Arrowy lightnings of soul.

Hark! through the alley resoundsMocking laughter! A filmCreeps o’er the sunshine; a breezeRuffles the warm afternoon,Saddens my soul with its chill.Gibing of spirits in scornShakes every leaf of the grove,Mars the benignant reposeOf this amiable home of the dead.

Bitter spirits, ye claimHeine? Alas, he is yours!Only a moment I longedHere in the quiet to snatchFrom such mates the outwornPoet, and steep him in calm.Only a moment! I knewWhose he was who is hereBuried: I knew he was yours!Ah! I knew that I sawHere no sepulchre builtIn the laurelled rock, o’er the blueNaples bay, for a sweetTender Virgil; no tombOn Ravenna sands, in the shadeOf Ravenna pines, for a highAustere Dante; no graveBy the Avon side, in the brightStratford meadows, for thee,Shakspeare, loveliest of souls,Peerless in radiance, in joy!

What, then, so harsh and malign,Heine! distils from thy life?Poisons the peace of thy grave?

I chide with thee not, that thy sharpUpbraidings often assailedEngland, my country; for we,Heavy and sad, for her sons,Long since, deep in our hearts,Echo the blame of her foes.We too sigh that she flags;We too say that she now--Scarce comprehending the voiceOf her greatest, golden-mouthed sonsOf a former age any more--Stupidly travels her roundOf mechanic business, and letsSlow die out of her lifeGlory, and genius, and joy.

So thou arraign’st her, her foe;So we arraign her, her sons.Yes, we arraign her! but she,The weary Titan, with deafEars, and labor-dimmed eyes,Regarding neither to rightNor left, goes passively by,Staggering on to her goal;Bearing on shoulders immense,Atlanteän, the load,Well-nigh not to be borne,Of the too vast orb of her fate.

But was it thou--I thinkSurely it was!--that bardUnnamed, who, Goethe said,Had every other gift, but wanted love--Love, without which the tongueEven of angels sounds amiss?

Charm is the glory which makesSong of the poet divine.Love is the fountain of charm.How without charm wilt thou draw,Poet! the world to thy way?Not by the lightnings of wit,Not by the thunder of scorn.These to the world too are given;Wit it possesses, and scorn:Charm is the poet’s alone.Hollow and dull are the great,And artists envious, and the mob profane.We know all this, we know!Cam’st thou from heaven, O childOf light! but this to declare?Alas! to help us forgetSuch barren knowledge a while,God gave the poet his song.

Therefore a secret unrestTortured thee, brilliant and bold;Therefore triumph itselfTasted amiss to thy soul.Therefore, with blood of thy foes,Trickled in silence thine own.Therefore the victor’s heartBroke on the field of his fame.

Ah! as of old, from the pompOf Italian Milan, the fairFlower of marble of whiteSouthern palaces,--stepsBordered by statues, and walksTerraced, and orange bowersHeavy with fragrance,--the blondGerman Kaiser full oftLonged himself back to the fields,Rivers, and high-roofed townsOf his native Germany; so,So, how often! from hotParis drawing-rooms, and lampsBlazing, and brilliant crowds,Starred and jewelled, of menFamous, of women the queensOf dazzling converse; from fumesOf praise, hot, heady fumes, to the poor brainThat mount, that madden,--how oftHeine’s spirit outwornLonged itself out of the din,Back to the tranquil, the coolFar German home of his youth!

See! in the May afternoon,O’er the fresh short turf of the Hartz,A youth, with the foot of youth,Heine! thou climbest again:Up through the tall dark firsWarming their heads in the sun,Checkering the grass with their shade;Up by the stream, with its hugeMoss-hung bowlders, and thinMusical water half-hid;Up o’er the rock-strewn slope,With the sinking sun, and the airChill, and the shadows nowLong on the gray hillside,--To the stone-roofed hut at the top!

Or, yet later, in watchOn the roof of the Brocken-towerThou standest, gazing!--to seeThe broad red sun over field,Forest, and city, and spire,And mist-tracked steam of the wide,Wide German land, going downIn a bank of vapors,--againStandest, at nightfall, alone!

Or, next morning, with limbsRested by slumber, and heartFreshened and light with the May,O’er the gracious spurs coming downOf the Lower Hartz, among oaksAnd beechen coverts, and copseOf hazels green, in whose depthIlse, the fairy transformed,In a thousand water-breaks lightPours her petulant youth;Climbing the rock which jutsO’er the valley,--the dizzily perchedRock,--to its iron crossOnce more thou cling’st; to the crossClingest! with smiles, with a sigh!

Goethe too had been there.In the long-past winter he cameTo the frozen Hartz, with his soulPassionate, eager; his youthAll in ferment. But he,Destined to work and to live,Left it, and thou, alas!Only to laugh and to die.

But something prompts me: Not thusTake leave of Heine! not thusSpeak the last word at his grave!Not in pity, and notWith half censure: with aweHail, as it passes from earthScattering lightnings, that soul!

The Spirit of the world,Beholding the absurdity of men,--Their vaunts, their feats,--let a sardonic smile,For one short moment, wander o’er his lips.That smile was Heine! For its earthly hourThe strange guest sparkled; now ’tis passed away.

That was Heine! and we,Myriads who live, who have lived,What are we all, but a mood,A single mood, of the lifeOf the Spirit in whom we exist,Who alone is all things in one?

Spirit, who fillest us all!Spirit, who utterest in eachNew-coming son of mankindSuch of thy thoughts as thou wilt!O thou, one of whose moods,Bitter and strange, was the lifeOf Heine,--his strange, alas!His bitter life,--may a lifeOther and milder be mine!May’st thou a mood more serene,Happier, have uttered in mine!May’st thou the rapture of peaceDeep have imbreathed at its core;Made it a ray of thy thought,Made it a beat of thy joy!