Landon in The Literary Gazette 1835/Körner’s Grave
ORIGINAL POETRY.
VERSIONS FROM THE GERMAN.
(Third Series.)
Körner's Grave.—Anon.
Where is my soldier's grave—where have you laid him?
Sculptured aisles and vaulted tombs to sleep among?
A nobler urn hath the memory made him
Of a life that was devoted unto war and unto song.
He is laid on the battle-field—there the youth slumbers,
Where war's mighty sacrifice is offered unto death;
There did his spirit pour its latest numbers—
"Bless me, oh my father!" sighed the hero's dying breath.
Ye, who so dearly held him, now follow me with weeping—
Yonder the green hillock his lowly grave above—
There the oak, tall and old, its shadowy watch is keeping—
There was the hero laid by brave men in their love.
Well may the young and true weep above his ashes,
Honouring the unforgotten one who slumbereth here;
Yet, amid the fields of death, where the red war-spear flashes,
German hearts will hold his remembrance dear.
Still let the urn of the brave one inherit
The crown that was glorious around his youthful head:
Maidens still ask his sweet songs, and his spirit
Is with us, although its mortal veil be fled.
Never, on the noble race in which he led ye, falter—
Oh, my German people! forget ye not the brave;
Vow ye to your country's cause, as if upon an altar—
Make ye an altar of my youthful hero's grave!
Although but in its youth-tide, already adorning
The early oak, with summer, hung around each graceful bough,
Stately and pleasant, amid the skies of morning,
Amid the rich and painted clouds it reared its lofty brow.
So bloomed our hero! and for the sunny hours
That lifted up his young green head so beautiful above,
There came forth all the music from the forest's deepest bowers,
And sung in his boughs like the singing of love!
There was song amid the leaves, as if Apollo had suspended
His old heroic lyre amid the thick green shade—
He the god of bard and hero:—too soon the music ended—
A storm in early summer, low the youthful oak-tree laid.
Too soon death seized my bravest,—in the first spring-tide of honour
He fell in glorious battle, a hero and a bard;
Dear was the debt which his country took upon her,—
Her praise and her remembrance is the patriot's reward.
First in the holy warfare for liberty he perished—
The path in which he led to the youthful brave belongs;
Follow ye his footsteps—so be his memory cherished,
While nightingales amid the boughs mourn for his lovely songs.
L. E. L.