Poems by Christian Morgenstern




(Click here for the original German version)

[1]

Birth of Philosophy

The heath sheep glares at me with frightened awe
as though I were the first of men it saw.
Contagious glare! We stand as though asleep;
it seems the first time that I see a sheep.



[2]

Scariboo

The Winglewangle phlutters
through widowadowood,
the crimson Fingoor splutters
and scary screaks the Scrood.



[3]

The Picket Fence

One time there was a picket fence
with space to gaze from hence to thence.

An architect who saw this sight
approached it suddenly one night,

removed the spaces from the fence,
and built of them a residence.

The picket fence stood there dumbfounded
with pickets wholly unsurrounded,

a view so loathsome and obscene,
the Senate had to intervene.

The architect, however, flew
to Afri- or Americoo.




[4]

At the Housefly Planet

Upon the housefly planet
the fate of the human is grim:
for what he does here to the housefly,
the fly does there unto him.

To paper with honey cover
the humans there adhere,
while others are doomed to hover
near death in vapid beer.

However, one practice of humans
the flies will not undertake:
they will not bake us in muffins
nor swallow us by mistake.





[5]

The Does' Prayer

The does, as the hour grows late,
med-it-ate;

med-it-nine;

med-i-ten;

med-eleven;

med-twelve;

mednight!

The does, as the hour grows late,
meditate.
They fold their little toesies,
the doesies.




[6]

The Impossible Fact

Palmstroem, old, an aimless rover,
walking in the wrong direction
at a busy intersection
is run over.

"How," he says, his life restoring
and with pluck his death ignoring,
"can an accident like this
ever happen? What's amiss?

"Did the state administration
fail in motor transportation?
Did police ignore the need
for reducing driving speed?

"Isn't there a prohibition,
barring motorized transmission
of the living to the dead?
Was the driver right who sped . . . ?"

Tightly swathed in dampened tissues
he explores the legal issues,
and it soon is clear as air:
Cars were not permitted there!

And he comes to the conclusion:
His mishap was an illusion,
for, he reasons pointedly,
that which must not, can not be.




[7]

The Funnels

[two versions]

a)

Two funnels travel through the night;
a sylvan moon's canescent light
 employs their bodies' narrow
         flue in flowing pale
              and cheerful
                   thro
                    ug
                     h


b)

A funnel ambles through the night.
 Within its body, moonbeams white
            converge as they
               descend upon
                   its forest
                   pathway
                     and
                      so
                      on




[8]

The Aesthetic Weasel

A weasel
perched on an easel
within a patch of teasel.

But why
and how?

The Moon Cow
whispered her reply
one time:

The sopheest-
icated beest
did it just for the rhyme.




[9]

The Seagulls

The seagulls by their looks suggest
that Emma is their name;
they wear a white and fluffy vest
and are the hunter's game.

I never shoot a seagull dead;
their life I do not take.
I like to feed them gingerbread
and bits of raisin cake.

O human, you will never fly
the way the seagulls do;
but if your name is Emma, why,
be glad they look like you.




These translations are done by Karl F. Ross.
I think it's okay to post them here, yet I couldn't contact www.jbeilharz.de to ask. Their guestbook isn't available.