Sonnets
übersetzt von Mascha Hansen
Weitere Übersetzungen von Schwarz-Gedichten ins Englische finden sich hier: OneGrayOrange
Tho‘ love is blind
Die Lieb ist blind
Tho‘ love is blind, it certainly can see:
Fair sight it owns, to then starblind to prove,
Considered great, forever child to be,
It’s quite agile, and yet it cannot move.
To understand, we have to think anew:
It’s blind because its mind’s in disarray
And since its heart’s own eye does look askew
It cannot see that it has gone astray.
But what it loves seems ever blemish-free
Though more than flawed, that flaw it cannot see,
But what it loves escapes infirmity.
Bus as in truth a fault we’ll always find,
I do conclude that love is standing blind:
Can’t see itself, but yet gives sight to see.
Now all is gone
Mein Alles ist dahin
Now all is gone. My comfort both in joy and pain,
My other self is gone, my life, my grace, away,
My most beloved in this world, she would not stay.
(Love bitter is, but parting is the bitt’rest strain.)
I cannot be away from you, I cannot leave you be,
O dearest Dory, out of self, I am without a clue,
I am not who I am, now that I’m not with you.
O hours, run, run on, you cannot envy me?
Oy Phoebus, let those stallions go, let go,
And go, slow days, instead let moonshine glow!
A day is like a year, in which I cannot see
My sunshine self, now go, o idle, sluggish time,
Heave out! Full sails! return that love of mine.
When she is here, then, time, you may lazy be.
Gods fall under love’s
sweet spell
Liebe schont der Götter nicht
Gods fall under love’s sweet spell.
Love transcends the will of men,
Binds both heart and eye just when
Their clear light has served love well.
Even Phoebus‘ heart once fell
Suddenly in love, and then
Gone were ease and quiet den,
How that dart stung who can tell.
Jupiter has long been found,
Hercules himself is bound
By this bittersweetest pain.
How then should mere human hearts
Fight the pangs of piercing darts?
These to miss is hope in vain.
Is Love a Fire?
Ist Lieb ein Feur?
Is love a fire, and can it iron bend?
Then I am fire-full, and full of pain.
To know my love’s heart’s cast is vain,
It is not iron: that my sighs would rend
It is not gold, for gold I know I’d blow
With my heart’s blaze; were it a stone,
It were a stone of flesh and blood, alone
A simple stone could not betray me so.
Is it then made of frost and ice and snow?
How so, when I with love’s sweat glow?
Her heart I think is made of laurel leaves
That cannot e’er by thunderbolts be torn
She, she, Cupid, laughs your bolts to scorn
She’s free from thunderstorms and lovers‘ griefs.
‚Tis chaste to love?
Ist Lieben keusch?
‚Tis chaste to love? Whence comes adultery?
If love is good, and nothing ill as such,
How come love’s fires ignite so much?
If love is light, who added gravity?
Who loves to love sails on a sea of lust,
And lets himself be caught in deadly nets
That can’t be ripped; on sin his heart he sets,
Loves vanity but virtue lacks and trust.
Eternity defies, who dies a knave,
Sees danger only when he sees his grave.
Then he who’s found in love’s most brutish heat
Had better fly, and hate her he adores:
If love is sweet, with bitterness he scores,
He’d better leave to th’dogs love’s bitter meat.
Love should never just stand by
Lieben ist nicht müßig stehen
Love should never just stand by.
Love must run all night all day,
Heart in love must crash away,
Toil and strive and all but die.
Love is never idleness.
It’s alert – asleep, awake –
For beloved’s favour’s sake,
Winds blow by love’s willingness.
Any strain to love is brief
But the pangs of lover’s grief.
‚Lover‘ is an arduous state
Cupid’s is a fiery yoke:
Gentle breeze that fire stoke
Else too much would deflagrate.