Franz Kießling:

Bäume

Im Böhmerwald, im Harz, in den Vogesen
sind ihrer viele, die ich noch nicht sah
und nimmer sehen werde. Doch ihr Wesen
ist mir im Baum vor meinem Fenster nah.

Noch steht der Wald, den ich als Kind bewundert,
und scheint nicht älter, als er damals schien.
Mich ändert jedes Jahr. Und dies Jahrhundert
wird mich begraben irgendwo bei Wien.

Vielleicht schon morgen unter Rauch und Trümmern,
ganz ohne Abschied, ohne Grabgeschenk.
Das wird die Welt der Bäume nicht bekümmern,
sie ist nicht meinesgleichen eingedenk.

Wer bin ich dann? - Ich habe kein Vermächtnis,
das meinen Namen hier unsterblich macht.
Doch wär ich gern in eines Baums Gedächtnis,
so wie ich seinesgleichen gern gedacht.

Ihr alle, die ihr meine Liebe hattet:
ich hab die Bäume fast wie euch geliebt.
O wär mir stets für euch ein Trost gestattet,
wie ihn der Schatten eines Baumes gibt.

Franz Kießling:

Trees

In French, in Czech, in German mountains' presence*
stand many trees that I did still not see
and never will. And yet their inner essence
lives in a tree that's growing close to me.

The woods still stand that I, as child, admired,
and don't seem older than they seemed before.
I change each year. The century expired
will see me buried on Vienna's door**

tomorrow, maybe, under burning rubble,***
without Good-Bye, without the last of gifts:
The world of trees this will not trouble:
it is not cognizant of me, who drifts...

Who am I then? There's nothing that bequeathes
eternity upon my fading name -
if not the trees' remembrance seizes
some of my good thoughts that I thought for them.

You all, who had my love when I was living:
I loved the good trees nigh as much as you.
Oh could I comfort you by always giving
you solace, as the good trees' shadows do.

---

*   The original first line mentions the Bohemian Forest (in the Czech Republic and Germany), the Harz mountain range (in central Germany), and the Vosges Mountains (in France).

**   Why "Vienna's door"? For the rhyme, of course. But also: Kießling died in Korneuburg, close the North entrance to the City of Vienna; and he is buried in its Zentralfriedhof (Central Cemetery), which, despite its name, is located not at the center of, but at the South entrance to the City.

Incidentally, the good burghers of Vienna - as most Austrians - love their old trees and fight fiercely for each single one that municipal, provincial or federal governments try to assault under the banner of modernisation. The only act of sedition - after Austria finally got its freedom in 1955 - occurred when some of the old woods along the marshy banks of the Danube south of Vienna - the type of wetlands called Au in the Austrian and Aue in the German tongue and which, not surprisingly, offer a paradise for common folk - were to be cut down. This mini-revolution was, by the way, successful: The area is now a bona fide nature reserve. But I digress.

***   Vienna was heavily bombed, and many of its famous buildings - ancient St. Stephen's cathedral, for instance, or the Vienna State Opera - burned down during the Second World War. This and other pre- and post-war events traumatized many of its citizens (like, for instance, the kid that was me). So I can well imagine Kießling dreading a similar future - as many Viennese indeed did - when he penned this apocalyptic line.