I never saw the spot
Where thou didst come and go.
E’en as the brook that flowed
Before that flowing there,
While that was thine abode,
We for each other were.
Two plants ‘twixt which is laid
A meadow full of flowers,
Two birds whose home is made
In sundered woodland bowers.
Son of another land,
Why thence thou fleddest, say!
O bird from far-off strand,
Who hither steered thy way?
Unto a chilly heart
A flame how hast thou brought!
How is’t that all thou art,
To whom thou wert as nought!
THE BRIDE.
IF I saw thee, if I saw thee nearing,
Steering round the foreland’s birches there,
Saw the sail first, then descried the veering
Purple-bunting, thou for flag dost bear.
If some glad lines thou didst bring me rather,
From thy sister, when thou mad’st for this,
If with “Yes” thou earnest from thy father,
From thy mother with a mother’s kiss!
Why put off our bliss? the years will bring in
Gold and goods, thou may’st be sure of it.
Love is like the floweret, and in Spring, in
Spring alone, it finds a season fit.
Hasten, hills are bright, and dales green growing,
Like the birds’ our bliss grows there as well.
E’en in alder tree-tops scorched and glowing
I quite happily with thee could dwell.
REGRET.
WITHIN the woods is left no bough,
Doth leaves and beauty bear;
The summer has departed now,
Here is but wintry air.
Yes, out of doors doth winter show,
And all indoors doth fill,
And should I to the world’s end go,
I should behold it still.
Let woods be green and warm the plain,
Let day be bright and clear,
In my breast would the cold remain
As ever chill and drear.
Thee, joy and sunlight of mine eyes,
They shall no more adore;
Sun of my heart, thou wilt arise
From out the grave no more.
My soul was thine, my feeling thine,
Thy life was life for me;
Except regret now nought is mine,
The rest has gone with thee.
’Tis best that, hushed, the hearth beside,
My past days I review,
When fires burn low and eventide
Has left me nought to do.
SPRING DITTY.
THEY’RE coming, they’re coming,
The winged crowds that erst from us flew,
To groves, that are blooming,
To lakes, that are thawing anew.
Where storm-winds were flying,
Sounds song now, melodious and sweet;
Where snow-drifts were lying,
Have gladness and beauty their seat.
’Tis but love arrests here
From clouds’-tracts the fugitive band,
And heaven’s own guests here
Seek only a bright-smiling land.
My heart shall be blooming,
My feelings be thawing anew,
Mayhap, they are coming,
The angels, that erst from me flew.
TO FORTUNE.
FORTUNE, goddess ever smiling,
A Born to make the hour sweet,
Not thee Queen of this earth styling
Does my lyre thy presence greet.
Without triumph, without guile, too,
With no power, no crown to show,
Thy mild aim’s to reconcile to
Dust all mankind here below.
Hail thee, for no heart e’er bleedeth
‘Neath thy guarding hand that stands:
Brother it to brother leadeth,
Over desert, fell, and lands.
Wind in Longing’s sails thou blowest,
Dost reward the faithful breast;
Shadowed in thy mirror showest
Thou the world of higher rest.
Why as false should folk belie thee,
Though thou fail’st now and again?
Couldst thou but to all ally thee,
None would be forgotten then.
Now, how couldst thou join together
All that in its fall did break?
One thou must leave, while another
Thou thy favourite dost make.
Light’s allotment, Peace’ donation,
Hope and love and joyfulness,
All that has life’s adoration
I possessed and still possess.
Thee I aye saw disappearing,
When securing hold on thee, —
Dust’s mild goddess, weak and veering,
Smile also for once on me!
THE HEART’S MORNING.
DARKNESS swayed my mind each minute,
Cold my poor heart felt and blighted,
Till love’s fervour was within it
By a friendly angel lighted.
Seest the sun from Night’s dark quarter
Sweep across the heavens beaming,
Gloom is scattered, land and water
In a saintly halo gleaming.
Seest the image of my heart then —
Thus its early morn upstarted,
Thus with fear, and void, and smart then
From its world the shades departed.
Sun, dispelling life’s night dreary,
Love, if breasts knew nought about thee,
What for are those days so weary
Which are dreamt away without thee,
Days for aye the same subsisting,
Hours to hopeless length extended,
Life in death’s domain existing,
With no light, no marvel blended!
THE DOUBTER.
OH had I but of eyes a pair
That keener than the falcon’s were,
A glance from checks and dimness free,
Through height and depth and space to see.
No pearl, the best the sea can yield,
No jewel in Earth’s night concealed,
No seam of gold in rocky nook,
For none of these my eye should look.
Upon her heart I’d keep my view
And look the false maid through and through,
The false one playing me the fool,
Now soft and sweet, now hard and cool.
Is cold within her breast, perchance,
When sweet and warm appears her glance?
Is love hid in its depth, when she
Appears to look most freezingly?
For prayerful sighs doth heaven ope,
For sorrow’s self hath earth some hope,
For me, it is my love’s sad doom
To doubt, and doubting to consume.
THE BRIDE.
COME, gentle stranger, take thine ease,
And at my hut alight,
Stir not the silent country’s peace
Upon this quiet night;
To sorrow is its stillness dear,
A broken heart is watching here. —
See, on the inlet’s naked strand,
A maid beholdest thou;
Her forehead rested on her hand,
She sits there lonely now,
And silent looks o’er land and creek,
And white as is the snow her cheek.
She many a day, oh, many a night,
Was seen there to repair;
Yestre’en she sat there by the bight,
To-morrow finds her there.
Erewhile a stray tear would she show,
But now she has wept out long ago.
When evening cometh soft and bright
,
The breeze flies forth apace,
And, like a glass, the bay shows bright
A heaven in its face;
Then sinks upon the water’s ways
Her rigid look to gaze and gaze.
And when again the wind awakes,
The billow’s face is stirred,
The gleam grows rough, the mirror breaks,
The deep’s bright heaven is blurred.
Then lifts the silent one her eye,
And looks up hopeless to the sky.
She once sat on that very strand,
Looked o’er that very bay,
She saw her lover leave the land,
And hither wend his way.
By you cliff was the sea his grave,
Nor ever back his body gave.
Her dreary quiet to molest,
Oh, stranger, then forbear!
And leave her grieving gaze to rest
Upon her deep sea there.
It is the only joy now left
Of all whereof she once was reft.
THE SUNDAY HARVEST.
HIGH beaming morning’s sun is seen,
And nature dons light’s lustrous sheen;
With song-birds’ notes resoundeth space,
And no one stirs yet in the place.
Why rests the farmer still in bed?
Is day not bright again o’er head,
Ripe fields and tilth their wealth unfold,
What makes him then despise their gold?
But see, he opes his cot e’en now,
How calm, how blissful looks his brow,
Oppressive cares that on him weigh,
He like a robe has cast away.
No tools upon his arm bears he,
His breast is light, his shoulder free,
Nor do his hands the sickle ply,
Although the harvest-home draws nigh.
At length the feast hath come about,
And child and mate he summons out;
And with them goes devout his way
Now to the harvest of the day.
And glad he sees, how him before
The crowds are gathering more and more,
And friends and strangers seek apace
The selfsame goal, the selfsame place: —
Unto the whitened walls, that there
The cross of holy peace up-bear;
Unto the very golden field,
That doth the eternal harvest yield.
THE OLD MAN.
A KING, meseems, the old man shows,
Approaching life’s long pathway’s close,
His journey’s goal at last to see
Triumphant, enviable he!
Time’s every storm already spent,
His might gains neighbours’ glad assent;
And errors bold, and passions gay,
From his still realm fly far away.
His people are a peaceful crowd
Of wishes soft in slumber’s shroud,
Of memories which within him stay
From old and sweetly by-gone day.
His sceptre is his pilgrim’s stave,
His burgh, his strong burgh, is his grave,
His royal pomp, his tranquil air,
His crown, his very silver hair.
THE FLOWER.
WHEN the spring once more is showing
Sweet and clear,
Day is laughing, sunlight glowing —
Wak’st thou here;
On thy soft stem givest birth to
Bud and sprout,
Like an angel seek’st from earth to
Struggle out.
With thy scent the breeze that blows then
Onward cleaves,
Gold-winged butterflies repose then
On thy leaves.
With thy cheek dares no uncleanness
Kissing play, —
Dew, wind, butterflies, sereneness —
Only they.
Since, like plants when summer cometh
Mild and fair,
All that’s sweet is born and bloometh
Without care,
Why should grief and danger go here
Hand in hand? —
Why is not our earth below here
Peace’s land?
AUTUMN SONG.
FOLIAGE paleth,
Trees their raiment shed,
And November gloom prevaileth
O’er dead flowers’ bed.
Snowy drifts their crowns have blighted;
But in hearts whom they delighted,
While the summer’s warmth did still remain,
They revive as memories again.
Roses flower,
For a few days’ span;
But outlasts their summer’s hour
Thy flower’s lease, oh, man?
Fair it shooteth forth and gleameth,
Glows its cheek, its bright eye beameth;
But against its stem a breeze there flies,
And it fades, and stoops, and shrinks, and dies.
Thou, who didst wake me
Out of earth’s dark night,
Mid thy flower-creation make me
Sprout forth pure and bright.
That though summer’s sun ignore me,
Some kind angel may have for me
‘Mong the memories he from earth shall bear
One, too, of my quiet blooming there.
COMING HOME.
LONE sheen, afar,
Flame, pure as that of a star,
Light from my father’s hearth hurled,
Art thou still twinkling, so late?
Happy, harmonious world,
Dost thou the wand’rer await?
Day is all told,
Dark is my pathway and cold,
Drear in the woods, where I fare,
Winter, the icy, is king;
Light, where thou twinklest, oh, there
Find I my love and my spring.
Haste on thy way,
Fortunate! — thou mayest some day,
Mute, when thy wandering is o’er,
This home parental perceive.
Light is thy dwelling no more,
Chilly and lonesome thine eve.
MY LIFE.
STRUGGLING o’er an open grave,
Sailing o’er an angry wave,
Toiling on with aimless aim,
Oh, my life, I name thy name!
Longing fills the sailor’s soul,
Seas before his eyesight roll,
“Lo, behind you purple haze
“Higher sights shall meet my gaze.
“I shall near a better strand,
“Light and freedom’s happy land.” —
Swelled the sail, expectance laughed,
Towards the Boundless sped the craft.
Struggling o’er an open grave,
Sailing o’er an angry wave,
Toiling on with aimless aim,
Oh, my life, I name thy name!
Ah, the haven calm and clear,
Peace of heart in by-gone year,
Hope’s gold coast, ah! hidden spot,
Never reached, and ne’er forgot!
Billows check the sailor’s course,
Over-head the tempest hoarse: —
Still is yonder purple haze
Far as ever from his gaze!
THOUGHT.
THOUGHT, see birds, that lightly swing and
Freely ‘neath the cloudy sky,
Even thou hast got thy wing, and
Thine own space, wherein to fly.
Fret not, that to dust’s low site thou
As a prisoner tied shouldst be;
Light as bird, and swift as light, thou
Art than either still more free.
If ’tis glad on earth, then rest thee,
‘Mong its pleasures glad also;
If ’tis sad, then haste thee, haste thee,
Forth to higher worlds to go.
THE FORSAKEN
.
HERBS and leaflets and flowerets small,
Lilies light and bedewed withal,
Damask rose with the smile benign,
For my bridal will I entwine;
Forget-me-not by the ripples clear,
Ne’er a thorn-growth thy stem doth rear,
How unlike unto thee it shows,
Which e’en now in my bosom grows,
Which has prickles in every part,
And which only so wounds my heart.
Sing my bridal-song, brooklet, sing,
Gentle fountain, and water-spring,
Sing ye glad of the days in store,
That the past I may mind no more,
Mind not life with its pain and play,
Mind not who did my faith betray.
Sing my bridal-song, brooklet, sing,
Gentle fountain and water-spring.
Softly sing ye my own soul through
To the false one a long adieu.
I will choose me another love,
Will not lightly so traitorous prove,
Will not kiss me while spring doth last,
But to vanish when it is passed;
Come, oh, death, take this heart of mine,
Let it rest now to-day on thine,
Though thy bride be with weeping blind,
Pale of cheek though thy maid thou find,
Though thy rose no more red should be,
Come, oh, death, come, sweet death, to me.
AUTUMN EVENING.
HOW bleak is all, how wasted, withered, dead!
Where is the bloom now, which the summer fed?
The dale is numbed, each woodland sound abated,
And for a grave dull earth is consecrated.
Yet from the grave in bliss the eye doth ope,
A higher world dawns for the heart’s fond hope.
Earth’s twilight forth the starlands’ sheen beguileth,
A home untransient to the spirit smileth.
Thus dream I in the autumn eve, and see,
How stark the foliage falls down from the tree.
A naked strand doth you bay’s deep discover,
And o’er the moon the silver cloudlets hover.
WAITING.
MOTHER minds her household cares,
At her sewing sister keeps,
And ahunting brother goes,
But myself with cheek on hand
I am sitting dreaming here.
Oh, my lover, where art thou,
Not yet traced, not e’en yet known,
Only yearned and waited for?
Collected Works of Johan Ludvig Runeberg Page 33