Page:The Works of J. W. von Goethe, Volume 9.djvu/374

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340
POEMS OF GOETHE
ELEGIES.

PART I.

ROMAN ELEGIES.

[The "Roman Elegies" were written in the same year as the "Venetian Epigrams"—viz., 1790.]

Speak, ye stones, I entreat! Oh, speak, ye palaces lofty!
Utter a word, oh, ye streets! Wilt thou not, Genius; awake?
All that thy sacred walls, eternal Rome, hold within them
Teemeth with life; but to me all is still silent and dead.
Oh, who will whisper unto me,—when shall I see at the casement
That one beauteous form, which, while it scorcheth, revives?
Can I as yet not discern the road, on which I for ever
To her and from her shall go, heeding not time as it flies?
Still do I mark the churches, palaces, ruins, and columns,
As a wise traveller should, would he his journey improve.
Soon all this will be past; and then will there be but one temple,
Amor's temple alone, where the Initiate may go.
Thou art indeed a world, O Rome; and yet were Love absent,

Then would the world be no world, then would e'en Rome be no Rome.