Ecce Homo Complete Works, Volume Seventeen · Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
MAIDEN'S SONG
Yesterday with seventeen years Wisdom reached I, a maiden fair, I am grey-haired, it appears, Now in all things--save my hair. Yesterday, I had a thought, Was't a thought?--you laugh and scorn! Did you ever have a thought? Rather was a feeling born. Dare a woman think? This screed Wisdom long ago begot: "Follow woman must, not lead; If she thinks, she follows not." Wisdom speaks--I credit naught: Rather hops and stings like flea: "Woman seldom harbours thought; If she thinks, no good is she!" To this wisdom, old, renowned, Bow I in deep reverence: Now my wisdom I'll expound In its very quintessence. A voice spoke in me yesterday As ever--listen if you can: "Woman is more beauteous aye, But more interesting--man!" Cave where the dead ones rest, O marble falsehood, thee I love: for easy jest My soul thou settest free. To-day, to-day alone, My soul to tears is stirred, At thee, the pictured stone, At thee, the graven word. This picture (none need wis) I kissed the other day. When there's so much to kiss Why did I kiss the--clay? Who knows the reason why? "A tombstone fool!" you laugh: I kissed--I'll not deny-- E'en the long epitaph. Hail to thee, Friendship! My hope consummate, My first red daybreak! Alas, so endless Oft path and night seemed, And life's long road Aimless and hateful! Now life I'd double In thine eyes seeing Dawn-glory, triumph, Most gracious goddess!
O'er man and beast I grew so high, And speak--but none will give reply. Too lone and tall my crest did soar: I wait: what am I waiting for? The clouds are grown too nigh of late, 'Tis the first lightning I await. Why did ye, blockheads, me awaken While I in blissful blindness stood? Ne'er I by fear more fell was shaken-- Vanished my golden dreaming mood. Bear-elephants, with trunks all greedy, Knock first! Where have your manners fled? I threw--and fear has made me speedy-- Dishes of ripe fruit--at your head. (_After a Gipsy Proverb_) Here the gallows, there the cord, And the hangman's ruddy beard. Round, the venom-glancing horde:-- Nothing new to me's appeared. Many times I've seen the sight, Now laughing in your face I cry, "Hanging me is useless quite: Die? Nay, nay, I cannot die!" Beggars all! Ye envy me Winning what ye never won! True, I suffer agony, But for you--your life is done. Many times I've faced death's plight, Yet steam and light and breath am I. Hanging me is useless quite: Die? Nay, nay, I cannot die! "Dearest," said Columbus, "never Trust a Genoese again. At the blue he gazes ever, Distance doth his soul enchain. Strangeness is to me too dear-- Genoa has sunk and passed-- Heart, be cool! Hand, firmly steer! Sea before me: land--at last? Firmly let us plant our feet, Ne'er can we give up this game-- From the distance what doth greet? One death, one happiness, one fame.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.