Poetry Thursday - Melusine by George Trakl

Melusine escaping from Raymond in the form of a dragon, from a manuscript
c.1450 from northern France in the British Library (via)

Melusine

At my windows the night weeps -
The night is mute, the wind probably weeps,
The wind, like a lost child -
What is it that makes him weep so?
O poor Melusine!

Like fire her hair blows in the storm,
Like fire passing clouds, and laments -
There for you, you poor maiden,
My heart speaks a still night prayer!
O poor Melusine! 

Georg Trakl (via)

In Czech and Slovak, the word meluzína refers to wailing wind, usually in the chimney; a reference to the wailing Melusine looking for her children. 

George Trakl (1887-1914), an Austrian poet, suffered frequent bouts of depression and died of a cocaine overdose after being prevented by his comrades from shooting himself after the Battle of Grodek in 1914.

Melusine I (German)

An meinen Fenstern weint die Nacht -
Die Nacht ist stumm, es weint wohl der Wind,
Der Wind, wie ein verlornes Kind -
Was ist's, das ihn so weinen macht?
O arme Melusine!

Wie Feuer ihr Haar im Sturme weht,
Wie Feuer an Wolken vorüber und klagt -
Da spricht für dich, du arme Magd,
Mein Herz ein stilles Nachtgebet!
O arme Melusine!

Melusine appears in folk tales, mainly in northwest Europe, as a woman with the lower body of a serpent.

"The most famous literary version of Melusine tales, that of Jean d'Arras, compiled about 1382–1394, was worked into a collection of "spinning yarns" as told by ladies at their spinning coudrette (coulrette (in French)). He wrote The Romans of Partenay or of Lusignen: Otherwise known as the Tale of Melusine, giving source and historical notes, dates and background of the story. He goes into detail and depth about the relationship of Melusine and Raymondin, their initial meeting and the complete story."

Wikipedia also says:

 "One tale says Melusine herself was the daughter of the fairy Pressyne and king Elinas of Albany (now known as Scotland). Melusine's mother leaves her husband, taking her daughters to the isle of Avalon after he breaks an oath never to look in at her and her daughter in their bath. The same pattern appears in stories where Melusine marries a nobleman only after he makes an oath to give her privacy in her bath; each time, she leaves the nobleman after he breaks that oath. Shapeshifting and flight on wings away from oath-breaking husbands also figure in stories about Melusine."

Raymond walks in on his wife, Melusine, in her bath and discovers
she has the lower body of a serpent. Illustration from the Jean d'Arras
 work, Le livre de Mélusine (The Book of Melusine), 1478 (via)

and:

"The chronicler Gerald of Wales reported that Richard I of England was fond of telling a tale according to which he was a descendant of a countess of Anjou who was in fact the fairy Melusine.The Angevin legend told of an early Count of Anjou who met a beautiful woman when in a far land, where he married her. He had not troubled to find out about her origins. However, after bearing him four sons, the behaviour of his wife began to trouble the count. She attended church infrequently, and always left before the Mass proper. One day he had four of his men forcibly restrain his wife as she rose to leave the church. Melusine evaded the men and clasped the two youngest of her sons and in full view of the congregation carried them up into the air and out of the church through its highest window. Melusine and her two sons were never seen again. One of the remaining sons was the ancestor, it was claimed, of the later Counts of Anjou and the Kings of England." 

My interest in the story and discovery of the poem comes from receiving this postcard -