C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
“Fair as the Day”
By August, Graf von Platen (1796–1835)
From Longfellow’s ‘Poets and Poetry of Europe’: Anonymous translation
F
With noble brow, with eyes in heaven’s dew,
Of tender years, and charming as the new,
So found I thee,—so found I too my sorrow.
Oh, could I shelter in thy bosom borrow,
There most collected where the most unbent!
Oh, would this coyness were already spent,
That aye adjourns our union till to-morrow!
But canst thou hate me? Art thou yet unshaken?
Wherefore refusest thou the soft confession
To him who loves, yet feels himself forsaken?
Oh, when thy future love doth make expression,
An anxious rapture will the moment waken,
As with a youthful prince at his accession!