Benjamin's poem of youth: I would like to let go of everything and go to the call | A poem and a moment

Walter Benjamin was an important German thinker and literary critic of the 20th century. Born into a Jewish family, he studied philosophy in his early years and later worked as a literary critic and translator. After the Nazis came to power in 1933, he was forced to leave Germany and settle in Paris. After the fall of France in 1940, Benjamin fled south and committed suicide on the Franco-Spanish border. Most of his writings were published after his death, and because of the extreme difficulty of categorizing his ideas, most readers have the impression of him as a sensitive and obscure metaphysical speculator. The recently published Sonnets subvert this perception and show us the writer's private feelings in his youth.

The Sonnets are Benjamin's rare poetic works, and the 80 poems in the book follow the quaint sonnet style, of which 73 are self-contained, and he wrote mourning poems for his close friend Fritz Heinler. Benjamin and Heinler met in 1913, and the two studied together in Freiburg, Germany, and participated together in the youth movement that was prevalent in Germany at that time. This youth movement began when a group of young people, dissatisfied with the dogmatic education system, tried to explore a new model of youth education, so they ran outside the school to experience youth and nature. During this period, Heinle showed a great talent for poetry, which was greatly admired by Benjamin, who also loved poetry. When the "First World War" broke out in 1914, many young people were eager to go to the battlefield to throw their heads and spill their blood and become "heroes", but Benjamin and Heinle were soberly aware of the horrors of war. Strong anti-war sentiment led the latter to make an irreparable decision: He and his girlfriend committed suicide by gassing a room at a student movement gathering, in order to make a desperate complaint of World War I.

Benjamin wrote in a 1913 letter about Heinle: "Look at the friends I am dating... Heinle, a good young man, loves to drink, has a good appetite, and can also write poetry. They should all be good. Forever German with dreams. Just don't dress very well. Although their friendship lasted only a little over a year, Heinle's death left an indelible mark on Benjamin's intellect and emotion as a fall of true youthful spirit. From 1915 to 1925, Benjamin wrote 73 mourning poems for his close friends, and in addition to expressing his feelings of remembrance, he also incorporated his thoughts on life and death, love, ideals, redemption and other issues into the poems. These poems are full of romantic passion and strictly follow the requirements of classical rhythm and rhythm, which is very different from his later prose works.

Before committing suicide in 1940, Benjamin transferred the poem, along with other manuscripts, to Georges Bataille for safekeeping in the Bibliothèque National de Paris, where it was not rediscovered by Giocho Agamben until 1981. For a long time, the study of these poems has been in a blank space. In a way, they represent Benjamin's remembrance of the memories, emotions and ideals of his youth, and are an important testimony to the transformation of his thinking.

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Sonnets of Mourning (I)

Break free from the time without you

Escape from your intimate heart

Like a rose at dusk

Liberation from the gentle contract

Sincere piety, bitter voice

So away from me, there was red on the lips

Burn in the black light of your hair

A purple shade is cast on the forehead

Now your portrait also teaches me to be disappointed

You have cursed indignantly, and you have leapt and shouted

In the land where you are holding high the flag

You raise the flag of no picture

Find your holy name in me

The flag sails are like endless prayers

<h3>Mourning Sonnets (5</h3>).

You are speechless again

You fall into the sweltering green hillside

Your wings carry the song of the wind

The emotional angel leaves you speechless

Oh, the voice, with his arm

Lift your breath to a cool place that is eternally clean

Like a stream flowing down from the top of Bliss

The courage to rejoice, according to God's will

Birdsong wakes up at the gray dawn

Look for traces of the beloved and know you

Hiding in the silent light

Like a youthful light, it passes through the beech forest

Wander where you used to talk until noon

Your words break time and break the body of the silent one

<h3>Sonnets of mourning (12).</h3>

One day, memory and forgetting

It was the last ballad in his cradle

There seems to be nothing to reveal, and nothing to hide

It seems to be a song without words, and there is no measure

The song rises from the bottom of the soul

Like wildflowers and cress growing on the earth

Like the organ tone of Mass

There is also hope, snuggling in this song

Only this song

Give sorrow and comfort

The song is intertwined with the starry sky and the beast

Death or friendship, no difference

Everything is in this song

The most beautiful thing, step into it

<h3>Mourning sonnets (thirty</h3>).

One last time, your hands

The language that descended from the grave to me rose

Look at the withered one, which is blooming again

My singing and tears are bursting out of my shell

In your hands, the blessed place

The song is full of colorful signs

Rushing urgently, like butterflies

Rises from the withered valley of the soul

They are thirsty for shelter in the south

Repeated adventures fly to lead them astray

Bring them from hope to the end of summer

Where the black buds swell, maybe it will

Red star-shaped calyxes rise again

But it no longer emanates, the fragrance of the floral fragrance

<h3>Sonnets of mourning (fifty-one</h3>).

How barren, the accumulated lamentation rhymes are scarce

How ruthless, the format of the merchant ties me up

In what way the soul seeks him out

All I had in mind was a metaphor to tell

These two verses brought me into the mansion

Like a meandering path between valleys

Orpheus's quest was also nearly realized

This is the forest road on Hades House

He pleaded so eagerly with the King of Pluto

Pluto returned his wife with advice

This road is short, but it is really important

The mysterious proverbs are still hidden in the lines of poetry

Just as she quietly followed behind him, faded away

By his gaze, by the rhyme foot at the end of the line

<h3>Sonnets of mourning (sixty-six</h3>).

Oh, I want to hear the call again

Say goodbye to all that is created

I wish I had never missed the words in his voice

I would let go of everything and go to that call

When I came to that voice, I also became ashamed

For the past, and for the suffering

We become vulgar and shameful, cautious and timid

There is no no nobility, whitewashing our poverty

So we sought it bitterly, and it became the night

Capture in the body, save our light

Rise from my patient hands

The memory of the language sent me

As your followers, in the land of God

There is nothing but my life

The poems in this article are selected from the book "Sonnets" and published with the permission of the publishing house.