Lying in Grass

I was in the middle of drafting a meandering rumination on the tragedies in Hermann Hesse's life, and then I thought better of it. Sure, lots of sad stuff happened in his life (he had severe depression and his wife was schizophrenic, which probably only exacerbated their myriad marital problems). Despite this, Hesse managed to write a lot of insightful, challenging work, and it seems reductive to focus on one already-overemphasized aspect of his life.

Siddhartha was his first work that I ever read, and the memory of experiencing that book still rests fresh in my recollection. I was just beginning my second semester of college, and I thought I knew everything. That book helped set me straight. It was one of the catalysts to my decision to study writing. It's short and stylistically straightforward, so I recommend it to any reader looking for a brief and enlightening novel.

Digressions aside, Hesse is lesser-known as a poet. The first English-translated collection of his poems was published in 1970, which posthumously afforded Hesse greater recognition for his precise poetic abilities. Here is one of those poems, translated from German by the American poet James Wright.

"Lying in Grass"

Is this everything now, the quick delusions of flowers,
And the down colors of the bright summer meadow,
The soft blue spread of heaven, the bees' song,
Is this everything only a god's
Groaning dream,
The cry of unconscious powers for deliverance?
The distant line of the mountain,
That beautifully and courageously rests in the blue,
Is this too only a convulsion,
Only the wild strain of fermenting nature,
Only grief, only agony, only meaningless fumbling,
Never resting, never a blessed movement?
No! Leave me alone, you impure dream
Of the world in suffering!
The dance of tiny insects cradles you in an evening radiance,
The bird's cry cradles you,
A breath of wind cools my forehead
With consolation.
Leave me alone, you unendurably old human grief!
Let it all be pain.
Let it all be suffering, let it be wretched-
But not this one sweet hour in the summer,
And not the fragrance of the red clover,
And not the deep tender pleasure
In my soul.

- "Lying in Grass" / "Im Grase Liegend" by Herman Hesse (1915), translated by James Wright (1970)