Home > Authors Index > Browse all available works of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe > Text of Youth and the Millstream
A poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe |
||
The Youth and the Millstream |
||
________________________________________________
Title: The Youth and the Millstream Author: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe [More Titles by Goethe] [This sweet Ballad, and the one entitled The Maid of the Mill's Repentance, were written on the occasion of a visit paid by Goethe to Switzerland. The Maid of the Mill's Treachery, to which the latter forms the sequel, was not written till the following year.]
SAY, sparkling streamlet, whither thou Art going! Are flowing. MILLSTREAM. Oh youth, I was a brook indeed; But lately Swell'd greatly, YOUTH. The mill thou seekest in a mood Contented, 'S tormented. MILLSTREAM. She opes the shutters soon as light Is gleaming; And beaming. YOUTH. If she in water can inflame Such ardour, Is harder. MILLSTREAM. Over the wheel I, roaring, bound, All-proudly, And loudly. YOUTH. Like others, then, can grief, poor brook, Oppress thee? Address thee. MILLSTREAM. 'Tis sad, 'tis sad to have to speed From yonder; Would wander; YOUTH. Farewell, thou who with me dost prove Love's sadness! And gladness.
-THE END- GO TO TOP OF SCREEN |