To my physician - Elisabeth Kulmann

Physician, cease thine effort! 

I speak and have no fear 

Thou canst no longer save me, 

I know that Death is near. 

The flowers that blossom sweetly, 

In autumn fade and die; 

They bud and bloom and perish, 

And like the flowers am I. 

While life and strength sustain me, 

I'm like the nightingale, 

Whose glad notes wake the echo 

Through forest, hill, and dale. 

Shall I, at Death affrighted, 

Complain that he is nigh; 

Or flee his dart in terror, 

Who says that I must die? 

Full well I know the marksman, 

All robed in steel is he, 

And naught can change his arrow, 

Since he hath chosen me. 

Physician, cease thy striving! 

I tremble not with fear 

Thou canst not save me longer, 

Since Death the Tyrant's here. 

---

Elisabeth Kulmann (1808 - 1825) Russia

Translated Frederic Rowland Marvin

Source: Flowers of song from many lands; being short poems and detached verses gathered from various languages and rendered into English by Frederic Rowland Marvin, Pafraets Book Company, 1902