Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Germany: Vols. XVII–XVIII. 1876–79.
Leave-taking from Life
By Karl Theodor Körner (1791–1813)Translated by W. B. Chorley
T
I feel, by my faint heart’s unsteady beating,
That the last pulse of my young life is fleeting,—
God, to thy hands my spirit I deliver!
How sounds of coming death all harshly sever
The fair dream-music, where bright forms were meeting!
Yet, courage! what hath given my heart true greeting,
I shall yet keep to dwell with me forever!
And all towards which my worship here ascended,
What my hot youth, with fieriest zeal defended,
Now viewed in Freedom,—once with Love all blended,
I see, as a light seraph, o’er me flying,—
And whilst each fainting sense is slowly dying,
It wafts sweet airs with Heaven’s morn-fragrance sighing!