Loneliness

Original version (German):

“Vereinsamt” by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Die Krähen schrei’n
Und ziehen schwirren Flugs zur Stadt:
Bald wird es schnei’n -
Wohl dem, der jetzt noch — Heimat hat!

Nun stehst du starr,
Schaust rückwärts, ach! wie lange schon!
Was bist du, Narr,
Vor winters in die Welt entflohn?

Die Welt — ein Tor
Zu tausend Wüsten stumm und kalt!
Wer das verlor,
Was du verlorst, macht nirgends Halt.

Nun stehst du bleich,
Zur Winter-Wanderschaft verflucht,
Dem Rauche gleich,
Der stets nach kältern Himmeln sucht.

Flieg, Vogel, schnarr
Dein Lied im Wüstenvogel-Ton!
-Versteck, du Narr,
Dein blutend Herz in Eis und Hohn!

Die Krähen schrei’n
Und ziehen schwirren Flugs zur Stadt:
Bald wird es schnei’n,
Weh dem, der keine Heimat hat!

English version:

“Loneliness” translated by Raymond Youngs

Harshly, the crows
Caw, as towards the town they fly away.
Tonight it snows.
Happy are they who have a home today.

You stand here too,
But looking back - alas! How long it’s been. 
How foolish, you
Who fled from Winter to the wide world’s scene.

The world – gate post
Where dull cold deserts endlessly extend.
The one who lost
What you have lost will never find an end.

You stand there, pale
Condemned to winter’s wandering to fly,
Like some smoke trail
Which climbs continually to colder sky.

Fly while you can,
You desert bird, rasping your song folorn.
Hide, foolish man,
Your bleeding heart in ice and mocking scorn.

Harshly, the crows
Caw, as they flap to town up on their way
Tonight it snows.
Wretched are they who have no home today.

Commentary:

Nietzsche (1844-1900) is best known as a philosopher, but he was also a poet. He was a nihilist, who regarded life as empty and meaningless, and saw human beings as helpless and exposed to overwhelming fate. This is captured in the stark imagery of this pessimistic poem. Worse than the life of crows, human existence is portrayed as having lost something irrecoverable, and wretched because of the vastness and coldness of its environment. I have tried to preserve the rhyming scheme and rhythm of the original, but to allow the translation to reflect its meaning more fully I have lengthened the second and fourth lines from eight syllables to ten.