The Elf King

Der Erlkönig is a poem written by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe in 1782. Goethe is arguably the most famous poet Germany has ever produced, and is widely renowned as one of the greatest romantic poets. Below is a translated version of Der Erlkönig, The Elf King, as translated by Edwin Zeydel in 1955.

"Who's riding so late where winds blow wild 
It is the father grasping his child; 
He holds the boy embraced in his arm, 
He clasps him snugly, he keeps him warm.

"My son, why cover your face in such fear?" 
"You see the elf-king, father? 
He's near! The king of the elves with crown and train!" 
"My son, the mist is on the plain."

'Sweet lad, o come and join me, do! 
Such pretty games I will play with you; 
On the shore gay flowers their color unfold, 
My mother has many garments of gold.'

"My father, my father, and can you not hear 
The promise the elf-king breathes in my ear?" 
"Be calm, stay calm, my child, lie low: 
In withered leaves the night-winds blow."

'Will you, sweet lad, come along with me? 
My daughters shall care for you tenderly; 
In the night my daughters their revelry keep, 
They'll rock you and dance you and sing you to sleep.'

"My father, my father, o can you not trace 
The elf-king's daughters in that gloomy place?" 
"My son, my son, I see it clear 
How grey the ancient willows appear."

'I love you, your comeliness charms me, my boy! 
And if you're not willing, my force I'll employ.' 
"Now father, now father, he's seizing my arm. 
Elf-king has done me a cruel harm."

The father shudders, his ride is wild, 
In his arms he's holding the groaning child, 
Reaches the court with toil and dread. - 
The child he held in his arms was dead."

Originally I had planned to use this poem as the subject for my explication paper, but a better candidate presented itself. This poem still strikes me on a personal level. Upon first glance, it seems a simple enough horror story or perhaps a metaphor for illness. However, when taken in context with the time it was written, the very early industrial revolution, it can be read as a bastard cousin to an environmental poem, complete with agenda and all. I say it has an estranged relationship to the environmental poem because it is not necessarily calling out for action on a tangible front, rather on a much less tangible front, though one that is just as recognizable today as it was to Goethe upon writing this poem. The statement here is not that mankind is ruining the environment, instead losing touch with it. The child, not having grown old and wise as the father, still sees the mysticism in nature and the world, whereas the father sees only the trees and the fog. Goethe argues that those in power losing sight of the mysticism in nature is dangerous to us all, a statement that many people mirror today. While Goethe's worries stemmed from the very beginning of the industrial revolution and his understanding that intense damage would follow the behaviors that came with such technological progress, the concerns voiced by modern writers stem not from anticipation of that damage, but from seeing it happen. We have watched the deforestation of the Amazon rain forest, and are in the middle of what some scientists are calling a mass extinction event. Though grim, it seems as though Goethe was a prognostic of our fate should we continue to ignore the widening gap between humanity and the natural world.

Waters of Life

One might assume that growing up in a state renowned as "The Great Lakes State" would mean that a lot of that time would be spent at one of those lakes. I honestly feel rather guilty that more of my childhood and young adult years were not spent on freshwater beaches, whose aquatic counterparts stretched out to the horizon; they could be called freshwater seas. While there isn't a Great Lake I owe many memories to, there is a much smaller body of water that has seen me and my family through many events.

Once every year, my fathers side of the family takes a week-long sojourn to a small resort (for lack of a better term) about a 45 minute drive into the upper peninsula. Pictured above is the view from right in front of the cabin where my family stayed in 2011. The body of water is the Snows Channel: a small yet charming capillary in the heart of the Les Chaneaux area around Cedarville and Hessel. From that dock I and any combination of my 15 cousins leapt into the channel and would either swim out of the frame or immediately jump out, lamenting the cold water before we jumped in again. The channel served as a mode of transportation: ice cream, shopping, leisure trips via pontoon boat, tubing via speed boat, tests of endurance via kayak. Only by means of the channel could one go explore the many islands in the area. The channel was a backdrop to bonfires, twilit games of beach soccer and capture the flag, and small banquets cooked by the family.

It was here that I learned that my baby brother had been born back home.
It was here that the ashes of my father were spread.
It is here that I have been every year of my life that I can remember.
It is here, to this channel and all of it's memories that I will return as long as I am able.