Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, MEIN KIND, WIR WAREN KINDER, by HEINRICH HEINE


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

MEIN KIND, WIR WAREN KINDER, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: My child, we were two children
Last Line: The belief, and the love, and the truth.
Subject(s): Childhood Memories; Youth


MY child, we were two children,
Small, merry by childhood's law;
We used to creep to the henhouse,
And hide ourselves in the straw.

We crowed like cocks, and whenever
The passers near us drew—
"Cock-a-doodle!" they thought
'Twas a real cock that crew.

The boxes about our courtyard
We carpeted to our mind,
And lived there both together—
Kept house in a noble kind.

The neighbor's old cat often
Came to pay us a visit;
(We have made the very same speeches
Each with a compliment in it.)

After her health we asked,
Our care and regard to evince—
(We have made the very same speeches
To many an old cat since).

We also sat and wisely
Discoursed, as old folks do,
Complaining how all went better
In those good old times we knew;—

How love, and truth, and believing
Had left the world to itself,
And how so dear was the coffee,
And how so rare was the pelf.

The children's games are over,
The rest is over with youth—
The world, the good games, the good times,
The belief, and the love, and the truth.





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