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Brimstone Butterfly in April by Eduard Mörike (translated by Maggie Roseneau)

October 1, 2012 Contributed By: Eduard Mörike, Maggie Roseneau

Cruel sun of springtime,
your waking is impetuous,
Only in the joy of May
thrives tender fare of mine!

There is no dear young girl
who, from her rosy lip,
offers me a honey drip,
so miserably I wane
and May will never see me
in my yellow dress.

Citronenfalter im April

Grausame Frühlingssonne,
du weckst mich vor der Zeit,
dem nur in Maienwonne
die zarte Kost gedeiht!

Ist nicht ein liebes Mädchen hier,
das auf der Rosenlippe mir
ein Tröpfchen Honig beut,
so muß ich jämmerlich vergehn
und wird der Mai mich nimmer sehn
in meinem gelben Kleid.

Return to table of contents for Issue 6 Fall 2012

Filed Under: Poetry, Translation Posted On: October 1, 2012

Further Reading

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by Arne Weingart

          Buffalo girls won’t you come out tonight,           Come out tonight, come out tonight?           Buffalo girls won’t you come out tonight           And dance by the light of the moon? – American minstrel song I. What in point of objective fact do we intend for the Buffalo girls when and if they […]

Perfume
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Last summer your skin tasted of orange peel, of ephemeral    lies buried deep in your lungs. Never more than two words: that hurts,   or like that, right there. Every- thing inside me became unlocked,   the Stanley knife you stole that looked as though it could barely break flesh,   the love letters […]

Three Themes from Edward Hopper by Feliks Netz (translated by John Guzlowski and Janusz Zalewski)

1. Morning in the City a naked woman in a room naked as her skin turns away in shame from the eye of God and reaches in hopeless self-defense for a towel to cover her breasts and sex she combed her red hair back with her left ear exposed finished her morning toilet but not as […]

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