Entrückung II

. . .

I am dissolved in swirling sound, am weaving

unfathomed thanks with unnamed praise, and

wishless I yield myself into the mighty breath.

A wild gust grips me suddenly, and I can

Hear the fervent cries and prayers of women

prone in the dust and seized in pious rapture

And then I see the hazy vapors lifting

above a sunlit, vast, and clear expanse

that stretches far below the mountain crags.

​

**This translation is by Carl Engel and was Schoenberg’s preferred version.

The second section in Entrückung narrates the process of transportation to a transcendental world. Once again, the print is a pretty direct portrayal of the poem’s content. This piece is a landscape, visualizing the wild, swirling marks in the atmosphere, mountain crags, and the vast, sunlit expanse.

Beneath my feet a flooring soft and milky,

or endless chasms that I cross with ease.

Carried aloft beyond the highest cloud
 

I am afloat upon a sea of crystal splendor

. . .