To His Gracious Tyrant
Who are you, Prince, that without fear,
Your wagon wheel may crush me,
Your horse may dash me down?
Who are you, Prince, that into my flesh
Your friend, your hunting-dog, unwhipped,
May sink his claws and jaw?
Who are you, that through crops and woods,
The yelling of your hunt will drive me,
Panting like the game?—
The crop that’s trampled by your hunt,
What horse and dog and you devour,
The bread, Prince, is mine.
You, Prince, did not, with harrow and plow,
Sweat through the day of harvest.
The effort and the bread are mine!—
Ha! You claim authority from God?
God hands out blessings; you but rob!
You are not sent by God, tyrant!
From: Mathieu, Gustave and Stern, Guy, German Poetry: A Selection from Walther von der Vogelweide to Bertolt Brecht in German with English Translation, 1970, Dover Publications: New York, p; 31.
(https://archive.org/details/germanpoetrysele0000math/page/30/mode/2up)
Date: 1773 (original in German); 1959 (translation in English)
By: Gottfried August Bürger (1747-1794)
Translated by: Gustave Bording Mathieu (1921-2007) and Guy Stern (1922- )
From Troubles of The World 