Robert Tilleard

REFLECTIONS ON THE LORELEI

It was getting dark when the young couple

Drove past the murmuring, luring outcrop

Concealing its echoing waterfall.

The Lorelei lurking beside the Rhine,

Named for the beautiful abandoned girl

Who saw herself in her faithless lover -

A reflection she would come to despise,

A revulsion that became petrified

And an enticing hazard to all men.

Her fixed love for this untrue looking glass

Turned her into a bewitching danger.

Men, helpless at her self-hating beauty

And her seducing, whispered siren call,

Willingly crashed onto the hidden rocks.

The restless woman in the car desired

To go to the crest of the Lorelei.

The heartbroken girl, once upon a time,

Had had a vision of her lost lover.

Far below the wide and beckoning Rhine

Welcomed her plunging body. The man refused

His earnest lover’s desire to ascend.

So they agreed to go to the village,

And there, in a bright Sankt Goarshausen bar,

They, on reflection, parted forever.