• My soul, Elysium of silent shades,
• Bright shades, resplendent once and ever after,
• Detached from all the turmoil that pervades
• This age – from its pursuits, its griefs, its laughter
• My soul, Elysium of shades, what can
• Life signify for you? What common features
• Are shared by you, fair ghosts of better days long gone,
• And this dull herd of soulless creatures?

(First half of 1830s)

• Why, O willow, to the river
• Do you bend your head so low?..
• And with leaves that lips resemble

(Lips with burning thirst a-tremble)

• Try to catch its racing flow?
• Though with every leaf you quiver,
• Yearning for the wayward stream,
• Still it dashes onward — dancing,
• Gaily in the sunlight glancing,
• Laughing at your futile dream

(First half of 1830s)

• Still love torments me with a vengeance,
• Still now my soul cries out to you —
• And through the veiled mists of remembrance
• Still shines your image, bright and true…
• An image treasured and pervasive —
• Unfading, never lost to sight,
• Unchanging, hauntingly elusive:
• A star set in the vault of night…