Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE EMIGRANTS, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: I cannot take my eyes away
Last Line: And crown each true heart's pure desire!
Alternate Author Name(s): Freiligrath, Hermann Ferdinand
Subject(s): Immigrants; Emigrant; Emigration; Immigration


I CANNOT take my eyes away
From you, ye busy, bustling band.
Your little all to see you lay,
Each, in the waiting seaman's hand!

Ye men, who from your necks set down
The heavy basket, on the earth,
Of bread from German corn, baked brown
By German wives, on German hearth!

And you, with braided queues so neat,
Black-Forest maidens, slim and brown,
How careful on the sloop's green seat
You set your pails and pitchers down!

Ah! oft have home's cool, shady tanks
These pails and pitchers filled for you:
On far Missouri's silent banks
Shall these the scenes of home renew: --

The stone-rimmed fount in village street,
That, as ye stooped, betrayed your smiles;
The hearth and its familiar seat;
The mantel and the pictured tiles.

Soon, in the far and wooded West,
Shall log-house walls therewith be graced;
Soon many a tired and tawny guest
Shall sweet refreshment from them taste.

From them shall drink the Cherokee,
Faint with the hot and dusty chase;
No more from German vintage ye
Shall bear them home, in leaf-crowned grace.

Oh, say, why seek ye other lands?
The Neckar's vale hath wine and corn;
Full of dark firs the Schwarzwald stands;
In Spessart rings the Alp-herd's horn.

Ah! in strange forests how ye'll yearn
For the green mountains of your home,
To Deutschland's yellow wheatfields turn,
In spirit o'er her vine-hills roam!

How will the form of days grown pale
In golden dreams float softly by!
Like some unearthly, mystic tale,
'T will stand before fond memory's eye.

The boatman calls! go hence in peace!
God bless ye, man and wife and sire!
Bless all your fields with rich increase,
And crown each true heart's pure desire!





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net