THE COLLECTED POEMS OF HENRIK IBSEN Translated by John ...

41
The one fares in the cause of profiteering
And so it’s laden to the very limit,
It’s for the realms of light the other’s steering.
2
If you by inclination are pragmatic,
Then board the stolid craft for your transporting,
And don’t, for God’s sake, sail with the erratic
Who choose deep, distant waters to cavort in!
West winds may well waft there a coolth climatic,
While verdant isles o’erhang the waves disporting,
Upon their shores fleet birds alight, ecstatic,
But, as you know, a storm’s what they’re reporting!
No, keep to straits and narrows for your setting,
There you can navigate the reeds securely,
The bottom scraping over mud and gravel.
At least you’ll get your monthly wages surely,
And I imagine that if things unravel
You’ll not take harm from just a little wetting.
3
But you are young, not just by calculating
Your years but in your mind, your mental powers,
So you may give the other scene best rating
Whereby the vessel glides past serried flowers.
You glimpse there your Ideal roam in her bower’s
Close-woven branches, troops of elves in waiting.
Don’t let her out of sight — her navigating
Can save you from the prose-life shoal that lowers.
This your Ideal’s no shadowy creation, —
She is a being, soul and spirit blended,
She is the goal of all your aspiration.
She’s pledged to be your inner self’s intended, —
Once rip her from your soul and you’ll meet yonder
With endless waste-land whereso’er you wander!
4
Each man has “something” that he idolises,
That seems the best of all things, quite sincerely;
One, slave to table-pleasures, gourmandises,
Another fancies horse-flesh, very clearly.