POEMS

OF

EMILE VERHAEREN.

SELECTED

AND

RENDERED INTO ENGLISH

BY

ALMA STRETTELL.

JOHN LANE

THE BODLEY HEAD

LONDON & NEW YORK

1915.

Emile Verhaeren

INDEX

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

From "LES VILLAGES ILLUSOIRES"

RAIN
THE FERRYMAN
THE SILENCE
THE BELL-RINGER
THE SNOW
THE GRAVE-DIGGER
THE WIND
THE FISHERMEN
THE ROPE-MAKER

From "LES HEURES CLAIRES"

I.
VIII.
XVII.
XXI.

From "LES APPARUS DANS MES CHEMINS"

ST. GEORGE
THE GARDENS
SHE OF THE GARDEN

From "LA MULTIPLE SPLENDEUR"

THE GLORY OF THE HEAVENS
LIFE
JOY

INTRODUCTORY NOTE.

Emile Verhaeren, remarkable among of the brilliant group of writersrepresenting "Young Belgium," and one who has been recognized by theliterary world of France as holding a foremost place among the lyricpoets of the day was born at St. Amand, near Antwerp, in 1855. Hischildhood was passed on the banks of the Scheldt, in the midst of thewide-spreading Flemish plains, a country of mist and flood, of dykes andmarshes, and the impressions he received from the mysterious, melancholycharacter of these surroundings, have produced a marked and lastinginfluence upon his work. Yet the other characteristics with which it isstamped—the wealth of imagination, the gloomy force, the wonderfuldescriptive power and sense of colour, which set the landscape beforeone as a picture, suggest rather the possibility of Spanish blood in thepoet's veins—and again, his somewhat morbid subjectivity and tendencyto self-analysis mark him as the child of the latter end of ournineteenth century.

Verhaeren entered early in life upon the literary career. After sometime spent at a college in Ghent, he became a student at the Universityof Louvain, and here he founded and edited a journal called "LaSemaine," in which work he was assisted by the singer Van Dyck, and byhis friend and present publisher, Edmond Deman. He also formed, aboutthis time, a close friendship with Maeterlinck. In 1881, Verhaeren wascalled to the Bar at Brussels, but soon gave up his legal career todevote himself entirely to literature. In 1883 he published his firstvolume of poems, and shortly afterwards became one of the editors of"L'Art Moderne," to which, as well as to other contemporary periodicals,he was for many years a contributor. In 1892 he founded, with the helpof two other friends, the "Section of Art" in the "House of the People,"a popular

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