Two Ominous Poems by George Heym on the Approach of War

Georg Heym (1887–1912)

Georg Heym (1887–1912) is not considered a war poet, but he sure saw the war coming. Here are two of his memorable visionary works. He drowned in 1912 after falling through the ice himself while while trying to save a friend who fell through while skating. Both perished.

The Horns of Summer Fell Silent

The horns of summer fell still in the death of the fields,

And cloud on cloud then flew on into the dark.

But on their fringes, the forests sank, forlorn,

Like retinues of coffins cloaked in mourning.

Loud sang the storm in the fright of whitening meadows;

He soared in the poplars and made a pale tower bend;

And, like the sweepings of the wind, there lay

A village heaped from gray roofs in the void.

But out beneath the horrors of the heavens,

Tents had been erected from autumn’s seeds,

Countless cities, though empty and forgotten.

And no one walked around in the streets.

And night’s shadow sank. And only the ravens still strayed

Beneath the clouds that hovered in the rain,

Alone in the wind, as in the gloom of temples,

Blackest thoughts in hopeless hours flee.

Translated by William Ruleman

The War

Now he has arisen: he, who slept so long,

from the depth arisen, out of arches strong.

Huge he stands and unknown in the twilight land,

and the moon he crushes in his blackened hand.

Broad on city's evening, broad and angrily

shadow falls, and frost of strange obscurity

makes the market's bustle stop in icy scare.

Silence reigns. They turn - and no one is aware.

In the street it comes to touch her shoulders light:

Just a question. Answerless. A face goes white.

From afar sound whining abbey bells so thin

and the beards are quaking round the pointed chin.

High up, on the mountains, he begins to dance,

and he cries: You fighters, rise up and advance!

Echoes sound: around his shaking, blackened head

swings a chain of skulls he wrenched from thousand dead.

Tower-like he squashes embers' dying gleam

and, where day is fleeing, fills with blood the stream.

Countless are the corpses swept into the reeds,

covered by white feathers, where the vulture feeds.

He stands over ramparts blue of flames around,

over darkened streets with heavy weapons sound,

over broken gates where gatemen lie across,

over bridges bending under human dross.

Through the night he chases fire across the world:

red-fanged hound of hell with savage scream unfurled.

Out of darkness leaps dominion of night,

frightful at its border shine volcanoes bright.

And a thousand redcaps, pointed far and wide,

litter up the dark plain, flicker up astride.

Who below in alleys still runs to and fro

he sweeps in the fire, that it hotter grow.

And the flames are leaping, burning tree by tree.

Yellow bats of fire clawing endlessly.

And he thrusts his kiln-staff, dark and charcoal-bound

deep amongst the trees to stoke the flames around.

An important city, chocked in yellow glow,

jumped without a whisper to the depths below,

while he stands, a giant, over glowing urns,

wild, in bloody heavens, thrice his torch he turns

over storm strung clouds reflecting fiery brands,

to the deadly dark of frigid desert sands,

down he pours the fires, withering the night,

phosphorus and brimstone on Gomorrha bright.

Translation at AllPoetry