HEINRICH HEINE - Repositories

^mt* 25
LAUGHTER.
I only laugh at the invidious grin
With which the goat-faced herd at me
do stare;
I laugh too, at the foxes, who with
bare
Gaunt paunches sniff and gape, all
hunger-thin.
I laugh, too, at the apes that look so
wise,
And swell themselves to arbiters of
thought;
I laugh, too, at the craven good-fornought.
Who with his poisoned steel in ambush
lies.
For when Good Fortune's wreath of
Life's best flowers
Is smitten by the hand of adverse
Fate,
And shattered at our feet lies all forlorn
;
And when the heart within the breast
is torn.
Torn, broken, cleft in twain and desolate,
—
Why, — shrill, ironic laughter still is
ours!
A
LOTTERY.
Every man who marries is like the
Doge who weds the Adriatic Sea: he
knows not what he may find therein —
treasures, pearls, monsters, unknown
storms.