Attention! Some of this material is not in the public domain.
It is illegal to copy and distribute our copyright-protected material without permission. It is also illegal to reprint copyright texts or translations without the name of the author or translator.
If you wish to reprint translations, please use the Reprint Basket (upper right hand corner).
Reminder: You must always use the copyright symbol © when you reprint copyright-protected material.
It sifts from leaden sieves, It powders all the wood, It fills with alabaster wool The wrinkles of the road. It makes an even face Of mountain and of plain, - Unbroken forehead from the east Unto the east again. It reaches to the fence, It wraps it, rail by rail, Till it is lost in fleeces; [It flings a crystal veil]1 [On]2 stump and stack and stem, - [The]3 summer's empty room, Acres of [seams]4 where harvests were, Recordless, but for them. It ruffles wrists of posts, As ankles of a queen, - Then stills its artisans like ghosts, Denying they have been.
About the headline (FAQ)
View text without footnotes1 Hoekman: "It deals Celestial Vail"
2 Hoekman: "To"
3 Hoekman: "A"
4 Hoekman: "Joints"
Text Authorship:
- by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), appears in Poems: Second Series, first published 1891 [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]
Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):
- by Ernst Bacon (1898 - 1990), "Snowfall", alternate title: "Alabaster wool", 193-? [sung text checked 1 time]
- by Timothy Hoekman , "It sifts from leaden sieves", 2002, published 2006 [ voice and piano ], from To Make a Prairie, no. 3 [sung text not yet checked]
Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- GER German (Deutsch) (Bertram Kottmann) , copyright © 2019, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Malcolm Wren [Guest Editor]
This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 20
Word count: 105
Aus Sieben, bleigrau, stäubt’s, bepudert Wald und Hain und Wolle, alabasterweiß, deckt falt’ge Straßen ein. Es glättet das Gesicht von Berg und Niederung - ein ebenmäß’ges Weiß von Ost bis Osten wiederum. Es hüllt das Gatter ein, Riegel um Riegel hoch bis es versunken scheint. Wirft sein kristallen Tuch auf Stapel, Stumpf und Stamm - wo Sommer nahm Logis: auf Furchen, wo die Frucht einst stand, vergessen, doch für sie. Mit Rüschen ziert’s den Pfahl als wär’s der Kön’gin Bein - beschwichtigt dann den Flockenspuk und dementiert das Schnei’n.
About the headline (FAQ)
Translations of titles
"Snowfall" = "Schneien"
"Alabaster wool" = "Alabasterwolle"
Text Authorship:
- Translation from English to German (Deutsch) copyright © 2019 by Bertram Kottmann, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you must ask the copyright-holder(s) directly for permission. If you receive no response, you must consider it a refusal.
Bertram Kottmann. Contact: BKottmann (AT) t-online.de
If you wish to commission a new translation, please contact: licenses@email.lieder.example.net
Based on:
- a text in English by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), appears in Poems: Second Series, first published 1891
This text was added to the website: 2019-01-21
Line count: 20
Word count: 86