Poetry Blog No 118 Walpugis Night- Next scene from Faust

WALPURGIS NIGHT - next scene from Faust

Walpurgis Night - (in German folklore) the night of April 30 (May Day's eve), when witches meet on the Brocken mountain and hold revels with the Devil- From Google Definitions

 August Albert Zimmerman 1866 Walpurgis Night from Faust

While Goethe's "witches" are traditional medieval types; there is no evidence they have anything to do with the magical, nature philosophy covered by the term "Wicca". He had a great belief in the spiritual side of nature and even as a boy set up an "altar" to the "goddess of nature".

In this Walpurgis Night scene he seems to use the whole thing more as a metaphor for the "night" side of human life and elements of the subconsciousness. (We, it seems, have come into / Spheres of magic and of dreams...) There is also satire and explicit sexual metaphor (censored by Goethe himself in first printed edition- though it seems pretty mild by today's standards). After Faust's harrowing vision that brings him back to Margaret's fate, Mephistopheles emphasises the symbolic nature of the scene with a meta-fictional touch by breaking the "fourth wall" and joking about the dilettante curtain-raiser. 

Poster for Lewis Morrison as Mephistopheles with supernatural creatures on Brocken mountain on Walpurgis Night. Wikimedia

WALPURGIS NIGHT

HARZ MOUNTAINS. THE REGION OF SHIERKE AND ELEND. FAUST AND MEPHISTOPHELES

MEPHISTOPHELES

Now wouldn’t you prefer a broomstick pole?

I wish I had the best of goats- for we

Are far still, on this pathway, from our goal.

FAUST

As long as I feel fresh upon these limbs, to hold

This knotted staff’s enough for me.

Why speed our course with other things?

To steal through labyrinthine valley ways,

Then scale rock heights, where sparkling sprays

Of never-failing waterfalls are fed from springs;

These are the joys that such a journey brings!

Sweet spring frees birch trees with its spell,

Already fir trees feel its power-

Why shouldn't it infuse our limbs as well?

MEPHISTOPHELES

In truth, I do not feel that now!

I’m wintery within the gloom.

I wish the snow and frost upon my way.

And look, how sadly shines the half-full moon;

Its red disc, reeking but a tardy ray,

Gives poor, dim light; at each step there’s a risk

Of running up against a rock or tree.

Just let me call a will-o’-the-wisp.

I see one there that’s burning merrily.

Hey there, my friend! Your company I claim.

Why squander such a brilliant flame?

Please light our upward pathway with its force.

WILL-O’-THE-WISP

I hope that my respect will help control

My very light and flighty soul-

For normally we trace a zigzag course.

MEPHISTOPHELES

Oh, ho! You’re thinking to ape humankind!

Go straight now by the devil’s sign!

Or I shall blow your brilliant flicker out.

WILL-O’-THE-WISP

You’re master of the house; without a doubt,

I’ll do my best to serve you nicely;

But note this please, the mountain’s magic-mad tonight,

And if a will-o’-the-wisp is now your leading light ,

Don’t take his pointers too precisely.

FAUST, MEPHISTOPHELES, WILL-O’-THE WISP

(IN ALTERNATING SONG)

We, it seems, have come into

Spheres of magic and of dreams.

Lead us well, show noble gleams,

So that soon we move on through,

Through these wide and wasted spaces.

Row on row the trees change places,

Slip beneath our swift-borne flight;

And the crags bow down their might;

And each long and rocky nose,

How it snorts, and how it blows!

Past the stones and grasses flows

Each small stream, each hurries on.

Is that babbling? Is that song?

Love’s most gracious, lost lament,

Voice of heaven’s days now spent?

What we hope? What we adore?

And the echo, testament,

Times from old, sounds forth once more.

Oohoo! Shoohoo! Near us play

Screech owl, lapwing and the jay,

They are still awake, are they?

Are those newts in bush and hedge?

Bellied-big with long, thin legs!

Roots like serpents wind and creep

All around the rocks and sands,

Stretching like strange, eerie bands,

Try to scare us, catch our feet;

Out of sturdy, living gnarls

Fibres reach like giant squid arms

After wanderers. Mice all throng,

Thousand-hued and swarm along

Through the moss and through the heather!

Fireflies mass in a crowd,

Hordes and hordes all swarm together-

As bewildering escorting cloud.

Tell me, are we standing still,

Are we rushing on past places?

All appears to whirl until

Rocks and trees are making faces,

Will-o’-the-wisps swirl through the spaces,

Swell and multiply at will.

MEPHISTOPHELES

Grip my mantle with all your might!

Here upon this mid-peak’s height,

You can wonder at the show,

Gaze on Mammon’s mountain glow.

FAUST

How through the mountain bases spreads

A strange and troubled, dawn-like sheen!

And even from the deepest chasms sheds

A rising light in each ravine.

Here vapours rise, there cloud forms spread,

Here gleams a glow through mist and haze,

There creeps along a slender thread,

Then gushes forth, a spring before our gaze.

It shifts and winds on for a stretch

Through valleys with a hundred veins,

Then pressed into a corner cleft

Becomes a single strand again.

And nearby sparks strew forth and fall,

Out-sprayed like dazzling, golden sand,

Just look! the height of rocky wall

Is kindled to a flaming brand.

MEPHISTOPHELES

Does not Lord Mammon with magnificence

Illuminate the palace for the feast?

You’re fortunate to witness these events;

I sense already the rowdy guests.

FAUST

Oh, how the gale now rages through the air!

It blasts my neck like blows from fists!

MEPHISTOPHELES

Grip to the ancient ribs of rock, beware-

Don’t be down-hurled into this tomb abyss.

Mist thickens night. Just hear

The crashing in the forest there!

Frightened off, the owls are flying.

Pillars of wild-sighing,

Ever-green palaces shatter.

Branches creak and crack and clatter!

The trunks are groaning mightily!

The roots gape, grating noisily!

In a terrifying-tangled fall

Down they crash, each onto all;

And through the debris-strewn abyss,

The wild winds howl and hiss.

Do you hear voices here on high?

In the distance, closer by?

On the mountain, all along

Streams a fury now of magic song!

WITCHES (IN CHORUS)

The witches ride to Brocken’s scene,

The stubble is yellow, corn is green.

And there a great crowd’s gathering,

Lord Urian sits over them.

So we go over dale and hill,

The witches fart, the he-goats smell.

VOICE

Old Balbo’s coming here alone,

Upon a farrowing fat sow she’s flown.

CHORUS

Give honour now, when honour's due!

Dame Balbo forward! to lead the crew!

A mother on a good, sound swine;

The whole witch horde will ride behind.

VOICE

Which way now did you come?

VOICE

Over Ilstenstein I flew!

I peeped into an owl’s nest passing through.

It made great eyes at me.

VOICE

Oh, go to hell!

Why ride so fast, pray tell?

VOICE

She took some of my skin,

Just see my wounded limbs!

WITCHES’ CHORUS

The way is broad, the way is long,

Then why this pointless, maddened throng?

The broomsticks scratch, the pitchforks poke-

If the mother bursts, the child will choke.

HALF CHORUS OF WITCH-MASTERS

We creep like shell-bound snails, we’re sure

The women are all far before.

For going to foul evil’s door,

They go a thousand steps before.

THE OTHER HALF

That doesn’t bother us, indeed

The women can fly on with speed;

For let her hurry without stop,

A man can do it in one hop.

VOICE (FROM ABOVE)

Come up, come up from rock-bound lake!

VOICE (FROM BELOW)

We’d like to be on your poetic height.

We wash until we shine from head to toe

Yet we’re unfruitful, even so.

BOTH CHORUSES

The wind is still, the starlight flies,

The troubled moon is glad to hide.

Now whizzing by, the magic choir

Sprays many thousand sparks of fire.

VOICE (FROM BELOW)

Stop, I’m left!

VOICE (FROM ABOVE)

Who calls from rocky clefts?

VOICE (FROM BELOW)

Take me too! Oh, take me!

I’ve climbed three centuries

Already, yet cannot reach the peak.

And my own kind is all I wish to seek.

BOTH CHOIRS

The broom or stick will carry you,

The billy goat or pitchfork too;

Those who can’t lift themselves tonight

Are doomed forever to their plight.

HALF-WITCH (FROM BELOW)

For such a time I’ve tripped behind,

The rest are far ahead I find!

I had no peace in my own place,

Yet here I can’t keep up the pace.

CHORUS OF WITCHES

The salve gives courage to the witches,

Sails can be made with rags and stitches;

Any trough can make a ship. We say

You’ll never fly if not today.

BOTH CHOIRS

And when we sweep and fly around

The peak, then swoop down near the ground,

We cover heath land, far and wide,

With swarms from witch-hood’s wild night ride.

THEY SETTLE DOWN

MEPHISTOPHELES

They press and push, they rustle and rattle!

They swish and swirl, they tussle and tattle!

It shines and sparkles, stinks and burns-

The real witch element returns!

Just stick with me! or we’ll be parted soon.

Where are you?

FAUST (IN THE DISTANCE)

Here!

MEPHISTOPHELES

What! Separated already now?

I must use my domestic power.

Room! Squire Voland comes. Room! Lovely rabble, room!

Here, doctor, cling to me! Now in one leap we’ll zoom

Away from crowds of company.

It’s too mad, even for the likes of me.

There near us something gleams with quite a special glow,

It draws me towards that shrubbery.

Come, come! we’ll slip in there, let’s go.

FAUST

You may as well lead on, you spirit of contradiction!

Yet still I think that this is really bright-

We travel to the Brocken on Walpurgisnight,

Then set about to end in isolation.

MEPHISTOPHELES

Just see there, multi-coloured flames

Have made a cheerful club. It’s plain,

In little groups one’s not alone.

FAUST

Yet I’d prefer that higher zone.

I see the fires; smoke-swirls swell.

The crowd streams towards the evil one;

There many riddles would be undone.

MEPHISTOPHELES

And many new evolved as well.

Just let the great world whizz on by,

Let us dwell here in peace, say I.

It has, in fact, long been related

That in the greater world, the smaller are created.

I see young witches in a naked state,

And older, who are cleverly well-dressed.

Be friendly, that’s my only wish;

The effort’s small, the fun is great.

The sounding of some instruments I hear.

Damn din. One must get used to it, I fear.

Come on! Come on! There’s nothing for it but

For me to go and take you to this lot

And thus bind you anew. Now go

And tell me, isn’t this some space, my friend?

Just look out there, you barely glimpse the end,

A hundred fires burning in a row.

They dance, they chat, they cook and drink, embrace;

Now tell me where is there a better place!

FAUST

But when you introduce me at the revel,

Will you appear as sorcerer or devil?

MEPHISTOPHELES

I’m used to going incognito, as you know,

But on a gala day one lets one’s order show.

It’s not a garter that shows my due,

But here the cloven foot is held in honour true.

You see the snail there? Towards us it comes creeping,

With tentative and groping face;

It’s sensed I’m something out of keeping.

For even if I wished, I can’t hide in this place.

Come then! We’ll visit each fire, see what’s brewing;

I’ll do the courting, you the wooing.

TO SOME WHO ARE SITTING AROUND GLOWING COALS

Old sirs, why are you at the end down here?

I’d praise you now if you were nicely in the middle,

Engulfed by bustle and youthful hustle,

One is alone enough at home, I fear.

GENERAL

Who'd trust the nations, for although

One has already done so much for them,

The people will, like women, don't you know,

Forever like the younger men.

MINISTER OF STATE

Now all has strayed far from the line;

I praise the good, old-timer days;

When we all mattered, I must say,

That truly was the golden time.

PARVENU

And truly we weren’t total clots,

And often did, what we should not;

Now everything is topsy-turvy,

Just when we wished to keep it steady.

AUTHOR

Who, after all, now wants to read a work

That’s balanced and intelligent!

And what concerns our dear young folk,

It’s never been just so impertinent.

MEPHISTOPHELES

(WHO ALL AT ONCE APPEARS VERY OLD)

I feel that folk are ripe for doom's last day,

This is my last climb to the Blocksberg’s crown;

As my small cask runs low, I say

The world itself is running down.

JUNK SHOP WITCH

Do not rush by, sirs! I must mention

This great, new opportunity!

Just give all of the great variety

Of my fine wares some close attention.

There’s nothing in this shop of mine-

(Each is unmatched on all this earth)

That’s not done hearty harm, some time,

To humans or the world's true worth.

No dagger that’s not made blood flow, no cup

That hasn’t poured a hot and poisoned wine,

Consuming so some healthy chap;

No gem that hasn’t led astray a kind

And charming girl; no sword not used to snap

A bond, or maybe stab a rival from behind.

MEPHISTOPHELES

Old aunt! poor is your grasp of these new days.

Done and happened! Happened, done!

Just shift your gaze to novel ways!

For only novelty draws everyone.

FAUST

I must keep focused, self-aware!

For this is what I call a fair!

MEPHISTOPHELES

The swirling mass strives upward here;

You think you push, yet you’re pushed from the rear.

FAUST

Who’s that?

MEPHISTOPHELES

Just watch her with great care.

That’s Lilith.

FAUST

Who?

MEPHISTOPHELES

First wife of Adam. But beware,

Of her most beautiful, long hair,

It is her gem: unique and single snare.

When she has got the young man in its boon,

It won't let go again too soon.

FAUST

A young witch and an old sit there. No doubt,

They are already quite danced out.

MEPHISTOPHELES

Tonight, you know, all know no rest.

A new dance starts. Come on, we’ll take them on with zest.

FAUST (DANCING WITH THE YOUNG ONE)

Now once the fairest dream I dreamed,

I saw an apple tree that seemed

To have two apples, shining fair-

They tempted me, I climbed it there.

THE FAIR ONE

For apples you’ve a great desire,

Since Paradise it’s been on fire.

I feel a stirring of delight

That in my garden too they’re bright.

MEPHISTOPHELES (DANCING WITH THE OLD ONE)

Now once a vulgar dream I dreamed,

I saw a cloven tree; it seemed

That it possessed a great big split,

Big as it was, I fancied it.

THE OLD ONE

I give best greeting now- my dear

Knight of the cloven hoof is here!

And if your branch is big, then you

Won’t fear a slit that’s quite large too.

PROKTOPHANTASMIST

Damn rotten lot! how dare you cross my seeing?

Have you not long ago had proofs complete

That spirits never stand on normal feet?

And now you dance- like other human beings!

THE FAIR ONE (DANCING)

What is he doing at our fair?

FAUST (DANCING)

That one! You’ll find him anywhere.

What others dance, he must inspect,

If he can’t criticize each step,

For him it may as well have not occurred.

Indeed, he’s angered most when we go forward.

But if you turn in circles set apart,

As he does in his dull and ancient mill,

He would, perhaps, not take it ill,

Especially if you acknowledged him to start.

PROKTOPHANTASMIST

You’re still here? This won’t do in any way.

So vanish! We’ve enlightened you away!

This fiendish rabble knows no rules. We’re most

Intelligent, yet Tegel castle has its ghost.

Although I’ve spent so long on sweeping out illusion,

It’s never clean- it’s just beyond all reason!

THE FAIR ONE

Just listen here, stop boring us to bits!

PROKTOPHANTASMIST

You spirits all, just get this clear,

I’ll not stand spirit despotism here;

My spirit can’t rule over it.

THE DANCING CONTINUES

I see today there’s nothing I can do;

Still I am always ready for another trip,

And hope, before I take my final step,

To so subdue all fiends and poets too.

MEPHISTOPHELES

He’ll sit in any puddle he can find,

That’s how he gets relief below;

For when the leeches latch themselves on his behind,

He’s rid of spirits and of spirit in one go.

TO FAUST, WHO HAS STEPPED OUT OF THE DANCE

Why do you leave that beauty now alone?

So lovely was the way she sang.

FAUST

A little reddish mouse just sprang

From her mouth as she was singing now.

MEPHISTOPHELES

O, that’s all right! Don’t worry so, I say.

It is enough it wasn’t grey.

Who questions such things in a lover’ s hour?

FAUST

Then I saw-

MEPHISTOPHELES

What?

FAUST

Mephisto, see that place,

That beautiful, pale girl, alone and far away?

She drags herself but slowly through the space,

It seems her feet are both chained in some way.

I must confess, I fancy she

Seems like fair Gretchen now to me.

MEPHISTOPHELES

That does no good. Leave it! Beware!

It is a magic image; lifeless idol there.

Best to avoid her. Understand!

That frozen gaze can freeze the blood of man,

Turn you to stone upon the spot;

You’ve heard of the Medusa, have you not?

FAUST

In truth, they are the eyes of one that’s dead,

Not closed by loving hand. That breast

Is hers, on which she let me lay my head;

That’s her sweet body that I caressed.

MEPHISTOPHELES

You easily-led fool! That is the sorcery!

She seems to each his love. Now don't you see?

FAUST

What bliss! What grief! I have to stay,

I cannot draw my eyes away.

How strange that her fair neck should be adorned

With just a single, thin, red line,

No broader than a thin knife’s back.

MEPHISTOPHELES

Quite so! I see it too. Be warned,

She takes it in her arms when she’s inclined,

For Perseus cut it with one hack.

This fondness for illusion still!

Come on, just climb this little hill!

Here it’s as jolly as the Prater;

And if I’m not bewitched, I’m sure

I actually see a theatre.

What’s on, my friend?

SERVIBILIS

We’re starting now once more,

The last of seven things, a new release;

It’s custom here to put lots in our brew.

A dilettante wrote the piece,

And dilettantes act it too.

Excuse, good sirs, I’ll slip from sight;

For I must dilettante up the curtain.

MEPHISTOPHELES

To find you on the Blocksberg’s height

Is good, for that’s where you belong for certain.