Mitte des Lebens / alles ist möglich

Mitte des Lebens

Das Leben hatte Überfluß versprochen
und sog dich an, ein buntes Labyrinth;
schon mittendrin hat es sein Wort gebrochen,
und deine Klagen stürzen in den Wind.
Was auch von heute an geschehen möge,
mag unerwartet sein und wunderbar,
du magst’s als Lust erfahren oder Segen,–
doch ist es nicht, was dir verheißen war.

Garden furniture jumbled up by storm in front of old wooden shed.
Photograph: Christina Egan ©2012.

Die Zeit flieht schneller, immer schneller hin,
und desto mehr, je weniger verbleibt…
Die Hoffnung, die doch unerschöpflich schien,
verkehrt sich langsam doch in Bitterkeit:
Denn zuviel Tun und Trachten war vergebens
– auch jenes, das vernünftig war und rein –
und wird es bleiben, trotz geballten Strebens,
und war vergebens schon von vornherein.

Christina Egan ©2013


Tiny weeds coming out of cracks, with their shadows.
Photograph: Christina Egan ©2020.

Two philosophical poem with few images.

The first one surveys someone’s life, with joys and blessings and surprises still ahead, but with prospects already limited and some hopes crushed.

The second poem breathes awareness, acceptance, confidence: “Everything is important… Everything is possible”! Is it about life in the moment?

Past Poppies / Zimtsterne

Psalm (Lachen werden die Seen)

Psalm
(Lachen werden die Seen)

Noch einmal schlagen die Glocken
und schweigen. Tief atmet endlich der See.

Im Laube schweben gleich geronnenem Licht
Tupfer von weichem Weiß und Gelb.

Duftend, betäubend bäumt sich die Erde
ungezähmt in den späten Himmel.

Auf dunkelgoldenen Schwingen
naht von den Bergen die Nacht;

selten sanft und blau wird sie sein
und sterngeschmückt wie eine Braut.

Tanzen, tanzen werden die Berge,
und lachen, lachen werden die Seen!

Christina Egan ©2011

Cascades of luscious purple flowers and tall palm-trees in the sunset.

Let the floods clap their hands / let the hills be joyful together!

Die Ströme sollen frohlocken / und die Berge seien fröhlich!

Psalm 98,8

Northern Tenerife in January! Taoro Parque, Puerto de la Cruz.
Photograph: Christina Egan ©2019.

Sudden Summer / Happiness Beyond

Sudden Summer
(Not a Word Cloud)

Is this moon new or young,
a sliver or a crescent, silver
or golden in the deep blue,
the newly deep sky, is it
striking or dazzling or
mesmerising?

Is this a late spring, belated
and all the more welcome,
bursting with life, with green,
bright green, saturated
with rain and sunshine,
saturated with colour and
heat, heat unfamiliar and
all the more welcome, or is it
sudden summer?

Is this life at last, is this joy,
is this joy of life, is it zest,
is it just new life-force or is it
happiness or elation or
bliss?

Reality, as it laps up against
the shores of your eyes and 
your ears and your nose, reality
as it washes over the leas
of your skin and seeps
beneath, cannot be captured in
words, not even in verse: reality,
so dense it feels like a dream,
is not a dream cloud nor a
word cloud.

Although this poem would make
a good one, with the message of
sudden summer sounding out
like birdcall, flooded with light
and colour, steeped in joy,
as if words were written from life
and for life, as if words were part
of life, of the wide earth and
the deep sky and the reality
beyond, of the ever-flowing
life-force.

Christina Egan ©2024

Happiness Beyond
(Word Cloud)

Your life is a green reality,
it reads in large green letters,
and newly young;
the sky is golden at last,
it states in fine golden letters,
and saturated with joy;
eyes and ears are bursting
with wide bright light,
it adds in silvery white;
and at the edge there is
happiness beyond colour
on deep-blue ground.

These are welcome words,
sudden and possibly deep,
a mesmerising message
from slivers of verse in your ears,
from the new dream poem,
from the word cloud
of Sudden summer:
Your life is a green reality
saturated with joy
under the newly young moon.

Christina Egan ©2024

Inspired by the word cloud of the poem Sudden summer and written on the same day.

Kreuzung / Vollmondtraum

***


One poem has a person with dark hair and a person with fair hair falling in love at first sight. In German, the words for ‘junction’ and ‘to cross’ come from the same root: ‘Kreuzung’ and ‘kreuzen’.

The other poem describes a beautiful beloved man (or, by changing one word, a woman) with greying hair. The stars write the lover’s delight onto the sky, and the beloved one’s soul shines like a star.

Unterm Abendstern

Tall brick chimney with blackbird sitting on top.
Blackbird on English chimney.
Photograph: Christina Egan ©2018.

glanztanzend / dazzle-dancing

A handful of hand-crafted Christmas cards in different styles and colours.
A handful of hand-crafted Christmas cards in different styles and colours.

The poem does what it describes: inventing words, lining them up, and sending them to others to greet them and cheer them up!

The newly coined terms had to be re-created in English – where they do of course not look as impressive. “lindwurmwörter”, for instance, really sounds and looks as long as a dragon, while “dragon’s tail words” looks like three words, even though I added the tail in to get a similar effect in meaning and length.

In England, many people hang Christmas cards up on golden strings. During the festive seasons of 2022/23 and 2023/24, I crafted many greeting cards myself, each of them unique.

Seasonal greeting cards. Artwork: Christina Egan ©2022/©2023/©2024. Photographs: Miriam Hornsby ©2024.

Parkbank im Herbst

Autumn colours: tree with bright orange leaves, some fallen onto the ground.Parkbank im Herbst

Glühend hängt im Geäst,
welches sich klaglos entblättert,

das hehre Gestirn,
blendend und fern,

ein verspäteter König
ohne Gefolge rosiger Wolken… 

Und ausgeschnitten  aus den Schatten
ersteht ein Geviert von jauchzendem Glanz!

Christina Egan ©2008

Photograph: Christina Egan ©2016.

Buntbetupft

Drawing of three old-fashioned spinning tops.

The shape of the poem emulates two children holding hands and whirling around, or two spinning-tops…

Illustration from ‘Children’s games throughout the year’ (1949) by Leslie Daiken.

schweben und leben…

schweben und leben…

ich bin der schmetterling
der hoch am himmel hing

und flimmerte
und schimmerte

so daß der mensch der unten stand
als dunkler punkt im bunten park

den kopf hob und verwundert fand
wie hell die welt sei und wie stark –

wie klein er sei –
wie weit und frei

mein winziges und kurzes leben
in dem ich jubeln darf und schweben…

eben
leben…

Christina Egan ©2020

*

Peacock butterfly, its bright-red and patterned wings spread out against a delicate green and white plant.

What makes these musings verse is sound, rhyme, and rhythm. To read aloud!

*

This poem was published in the Münsterschwarzacher Bildkalender 2023, on the back of this beautiful image. (Photograph: Peacock butterfly. kie-ker via Pixabay.)

*

It was inspired by a poem by Josef Haselberger. We have written and exchanged
poetry for a very long time. I have several friends who are poets, and so does he.