Cain and Other Poems

by Walter Kaufmann

Book by Kaufmann, Walter Arnold

Genres: Poetry

Paperback

First published January 1, 1971

About the author

Walter Arnold Kaufmann was a German-American philosopher, translator, and poet. A prolific author, he wrote extensively on a broad range of subjects, such as authenticity and death, moral philosophy and existentialism, theism and atheism, Christianity and Judaism, as well as philosophy and literature. He served for over 30 years as a Professor at Princeton University.

He is renowned as a scholar and translator of Nietzsche. He also wrote a 1965 book on Hegel, and a translation of most of Goethe's Faust.

Reviews

[Steven Godin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Over the brilliant branches of
twisted dead trees,
beyond outclimbed love
and forgotten paths, one sees,
almost lost in the deep,
what prompted hope and despair;
and the final ascent, sunny and steep,
is a dazzling dare.

****

Slowly the moon
climbs through the leaves
and caresses my bed.
Gone is the day's oppressive heat.

Soon, very soon
all that now grieves
will be blissfully dead.
Never was sleeplessness so sweet.

****

The curtain arches in the breeze
a waterfall's suspended motion
no past or future but the ease
and self-containment of the ocean.

And who could say it is at rest
or moving? It is frozen fire
the gesture of a woman's breast
that curves and stills without desire.