LILI'S MENAGERIE.
[Goethe describes this much-admired poem, which he wrote in honour of his love Lili, as being "designed to change his surrender of her into despair, by drolly-fretful images."]
There's no menagerie, I vow,
Excels my Lili's at this minute;
She keeps the strangest creatures in it,
And catches them, she knows not how.
Oh, how they hop, and run, and rave,
And their clipped pinions wildly wave,—
Poor princes, who must all endure
The pangs of love that nought can cure.
What is the fairy's name?—Is it Lili?—Ask not me!
Give thanks to Heaven if she's unknown to thee.
Oh, what a cackling, what a shrieking
When near the door she takes her stand,
With her food-basket in her hand!
Oh, what a croaking, what a squeaking!
Alive all the trees and the bushes appear,
While to her feet whole troops draw near;
The very fish within the water clear
Splash with impatience and their heads protrude;
And then she throws around the food
With such a look!—the very gods delighting
(To say nought of beasts). There begins, then, a biting,
A picking, a pecking, a sipping.
And each o'er the legs of another is tripping.
And pushing, and pressing, and flapping.
And chasing, and fuming, and snapping.
And all for one small piece of bread.
To which, though dry, her fair hands give a taste.
As though it in ambrosia had been placed.
And then her look! the tone
With which she calls: Pipi! Pipi!
