“Ein Fichtenbaum steht einsam”
by Heinrich Heine
with English translations

Ein Fichtenbaum steht einsam
Im Norden auf kahler Höh.
Ihn schläfert; mit weißer Decke
Umhüllen ihn Eis und Schnee.

Er träumt von einer Palme,
Die, fern im Morgenland,
Einsam und schweigend trauert
Auf brennender Felsenwand.

There stands a lonely pine-tree
    In the north, on a barren height;
He sleeps while the ice and snow flakes
    Swathe him in folds of white.

He dreameth of a palm-tree
    Far in the sunrise-land,
Lonely and silent longing
    On her burning bank of sand.

Translated by Emma Lazarus

A lonely pine is standing
    In the North where high winds blow.
He sleeps; and the whitest blanket
    wraps him in ice and snow.

He dreams—dreams of a palm-tree
    that far in an Orient land
Languishes, lonely and drooping,
    Upon the burning sand.

Translated by Louis Untermeyer, in: Heinrich Heine: Paradox and Poet: The Poems (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1937), p. 84.

A pine tree towers lonely
In the north, on a barren height.
He's drowsy; ice and snowdrift
quilt him in covers of white.

He dreams about a palm tree
That, far in the East alone,
Looks down in silent sorrow
From her cliff of blazing stone.

Translated by Aaron Kramer, in: The Poetry of Heinrich Heine, ed. Frederic Ewen (Secaucus, NJ: Citadel Press, 1969, p. 74).

Book of Songs, Lyrical Intermezzo, 33

A pine is standing lonely
In the North on a bare plateau.
He sleeps; a bright white blanket
Enshrouds him in ice and snow.

He's dreaming of a palm tree
Far away in the Eastern land
Lonely and silently mourning
On a sunburnt rocky strand.

Translated by Hal Draper, in:  The Complete Poems of Heinrich Heine: A Modern English Version (Cambridge, MA: Suhrkamp/Insel Publishers Boston, Inc., 1982), p. 62.

A spruce is standing lonely
In the north on a barren height.
It drowses; ice and snowflakes
Wrap it in a blanket of white.

It dreams about a palm tree
In a distant, eastern land,
That languishes lonely and silent
Upon the scorching sand.

Translated by Max Knight, in: Heinrich Heine: Poetry and Prose, ed. Jost Hermand & Robert C. Holub (New York: Continuum, 1992), p. 5.

“The Fir Tree”

On a barren arctic mountain,
The ice and snow lie deep,
And an isolated fir tree
Is nodding off to sleep.

It's dreaming of a palm tree
In some exotic land,
That's pining away on a mountain
Of barren desert sand.

Translated by T.J. Reid & David Cram, in: Heinrich Heine (London: J.M. Dent, 1997 [Everyman's Poetry; no. 28]), p. 16.

Buch Der Lieder: Lyrisches Intermezzo: ‘Ein Fichtenbaum’

A single fir-tree, lonely,
On a northern mountain height,
Sleeps in a white blanket,
Draped in snow and ice.

His dreams are of a palm-tree,
Who, far in eastern lands,
Weeps, all alone and silent,
Among the burning sands.

Translated by A. S. Kline, from Heine - Selected Poems - A new downloadable translation

A Single Fir Stands Lonesome

A single fir stands lonesome
On barren northerly height.
He drowses; frost and snowstorm
Shroud him in swathes of white.

He dreams about a palm. She,
In the orient, far, alone,
Sorrowing stands and silent
At a blazing scarp of stone.

Translated by Walter W. Arndt, in: Songs of Love and Grief: A Bilingual Anthology in the Verse Forms of the Originals (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1995).

Heinrich Heine: “Ein Fichtenbaum steht einsam” (The Lonely Fir Tree), with links

Heinrich Heine: “Ein Fichtenbaum steht einsam” / “En nord’ unu pino en solo” (en Esperanto)

Heinrich Heine on Leibniz & Spinoza

Heinrich Heine: Selected Bibliography

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