Early Works of Karl Marx: Book of Verse

Yearning

A Romance

"Why sighs your breast, why glows your gaze,
Why are your veins all burning,
As if Night weighs, as if Fate flays
Down into storm your yearning?"

"Show me the eyes, like ringing bells,
That glow in rainbows high,
Where brightness streams, where music swells,
Where stars go swimming by.

"I dreamed this dream, so troublesome,
Past all elucidating.
My head is void, my heart is numb,
My grave shall soon be waiting."

"What dream you here, what dream you there,
What lures to distant lands?
Here booms the Tide, here Hope rides fair,
Here's fire in True Love's bonds."

"Here naught rides fair, here is no fire,
But see what glimmers yonder,
I'm blinded, burning with desire,
And I would fain sink under."

He stares aloft, his eyes shine bright,
He shakes in every limb.
His sinews swell, his heart's alight,
His soul departs from him.