The Poem (Wilhelm Müller – Seventy-Seven Poems from the Posthumous Papers of a Travelling French-Horn Player, 1821)

By the brook many little flowers stand,
Looking out of bright blue eyes;
The brook is the miller’s friend,
And my beloved’s eye shines bright blue,
Therefore they are my flowers.

Close beneath her little window
There I will plant the flowers,
There they will call to her when all is silent,
When her head inclines toward slumber,
You know well what I mean.

And when she closes her little eyes,
And sleeps in sweet, sweet rest,
Then, like a dream-vision, they whisper
To her: Forget, forget me not!
That is what I mean.

And when early she opens the shutters,
Then look upward with a loving glance:
The dew in your little eyes,
That shall be my tears,
Which I would weep upon you.

Work Data & Overview

• Composer: Franz Schubert (1797–1828)
• Cycle: Die schöne Müllerin D 795, No. 9
• Text source: Wilhelm Müller, “Des Müllers Blumen” (c. 1816; published 1821)
• Composition: October/November 1823; first published 1824
• Original key: A major; Meter/character: 6/8, moderate
• Duration: approx. 2:00–3:00 minutes
• Scoring: Voice and piano (transpositions are common)
• Form: an ABA′-coloured strophic design (continuous rocking pulse)

Data on the Poem

• Author: Wilhelm Müller (1794–1827)
• Stanza form: 4 stanzas of 5 lines each
• Devices: personification (flowers “call” / “look”), simile (blue eyes), forms of address, refrain-like repetition (“what I mean”)

Genesis & Cycle Context

The flowers take over the brook’s role as messengers of love: silent intermediaries between the shy self and the miller’s daughter. The colour blue (eyes / brook / flowers) becomes a guiding motif in the early middle of the cycle and prepares the scene of tears in “Tränenregen” (No. 10).

More on the cycle (plot, work data, all song articles) can be found on the overview page: Die schöne Müllerin – Overview.

Performance Practice & Reception

Pulse & tone: a calm 6/8 rocking, never sentimental. Consonants soft, vowels sustained; the “dream” tone (stanza 3) dolcissimo; stanza 4 with discreet brightening at “loving glance” and a fine darkening at “tears”.

Balance: piano right hand pearly and lightly arpeggiated, left hand an elastic basic step; the singing in one long line – no over-accentuation of individual words.

Reference Recordings (selection)

• Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau – Gerald Moore (DG)
• Ian Bostridge – Mitsuko Uchida (Decca)
• Christoph Prégardien – Andreas Staier (fortepiano; harmonia mundi)
• Fritz Wunderlich – Hubert Giesen (Orfeo)
• Matthias Goerne – Christoph Eschenbach (Teldec)

Analysis – Music

Rocking Pulse & the Metaphor of the “Glance”

Schubert’s accompaniment figures flow in gentle semiquaver / quaver waves; the 6/8 conveys “rocking” rather than “walking.” The syllabic vocal line allows the metaphors of looking (“blue eyes,” “loving glance”) to gleam in small points of light – always within a piano atmosphere.

Form, Tonal Space & Closing Images

An A–B–A′ impression: the first two stanzas (planting / message) frame the dream core (stanza 3); stanza 4 mirrors the image of tears (dew) – harmonically bright, yet inwardly “moist.” The close lingers without truly closing: a backward glance rather than triumph.

Analysis – Poetry

The poem “Des Müllers Blumen” belongs to the middle phase of the cycle Die schöne Müllerin and marks a decisive step: cautious approach now becomes an imaginative act of possession. Inwardly, the wanderer has already bound himself to the miller’s daughter. There is still no spoken declaration of love, yet the self begins to inscribe its feelings into the things around it. Nature, language, and desire merge into a secret ritual of love.

In the first stanza, the flowers by the brook are interpreted as mirrors of the beloved:

By the brook many little flowers stand,
Looking out of bright blue eyes;
The brook is the miller’s friend,
And my beloved’s eye shines bright blue,
Therefore they are my flowers.

Perception is completely coloured by subjectivity: the blue flowers “look” like eyes, and because the miller’s daughter’s eyes are likewise blue, the self declares the flowers to be “my flowers.” The water of the brook — already an established guiding motif — appears as the miller’s friend and as an intermediary between nature and feeling. Possession is not enacted in reality, but imagined. The world is reinterpreted in order to confirm the inner bond.

The second stanza unfolds a nocturnal scenario of action:

Close beneath her little window
There I will plant the flowers,
There they will call to her when all is silent,
When her head inclines toward slumber,
You know well what I mean.

The wanderer plans a secret action: he wants to plant the flowers beneath her window. Once again, the window appears as the threshold between the inner world (the girl) and the outer world (the wanderer). The address remains indirect: “You know well what I mean.” The poem plays with the complicity of things — as though flowers, brook, and window understood the language of love. Reality and fantasy begin to intermingle.

In the third stanza, this dream logic intensifies:

And when she closes her little eyes,
And sleeps in sweet, sweet rest,
Then, like a dream-vision, they whisper
To her: Forget, forget me not!
That is what I mean.

Now the self no longer speaks itself — it lets the flowers speak within the miller’s daughter’s dream. The wish for reciprocation is displaced into a dream voice. Especially telling is the formula “Forget, forget me not!”: the wanderer already fears being overlooked. Love is not yet fulfilled — it exists as a plea for remembrance.

The fourth stanza joins image of night and image of morning:

And when early she opens the shutters,
Then look upward with a loving glance:
The dew in your little eyes,
That shall be my tears,
Which I would weep upon you.

The morning dew on the flowers is interpreted as the lover’s tears. In this way, the previously cheerful image tips into a first intimation of pain. Love is conceived as devotion carried to the point of self-dissolution: his own tears are to become part of nature so that they may be seen by the beloved. The poem joins tenderness and suffering in a single gesture.

Altogether, a clear shift becomes visible here: the wanderer scarcely addresses the miller’s daughter herself any longer, but rather her surroundings. Love becomes a projection into things and images. The self builds itself a world in which its feelings already seem answered — a decisive step on the path toward later disappointment.

Meaning & Effect within the Cycle

“Des Müllers Blumen” marks within the cycle the phase of growing inwardness. The wanderer has found his place and begins to use nature itself as the language of his love. Flowers, dew, window, and brook become bearers of messages. Reality is poetically reshaped.

At the same time, the central structure of the whole cycle becomes visible: love exists above all within the speaker’s interior. There is as yet no real relationship — only images, wishes, and projections. The wanderer speaks to things, not to people. For this very reason, the later rupture is already prepared: where love exists only in imagination, disappointment may strike all the more deeply.

The poem therefore acts like a turning point: from hopeful courtship there emerges a quiet ritual of love, from natural wandering an attachment to a place — and from free movement an increasing fixation. The mill becomes the inward centre of the cycle, the flowers the first signs of a love-suffering that begins gently, yet already bears pain within itself.

Evgenia Fölsche – Performances & Audio

Pianist Evgenia Fölsche reads the song as an intimate window nocturne: a calm rocking pulse, “speaking” legato, a shimmering dream stanza, and a tender, moist close.

Audio example: Des Müllers Blumen with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Gerald Moore

To the cycle overview