Laudator Temporis Acti

Johann Peter Hebel, An Herrn Pfarrer Jäck (Letter to the Reverend Mr Jäck, tr. Leonard Forster):

It's true, sir, I have no tree of my own, I've got no house, I've got no sheep in the fold, no plough in the field, no beehive in my yard, no cat, no hen, and very often no money either. It makes no odds; even so, there's not a farmer in the village as rich as I am. You know how it's done; you make believe you've got it. And so I make believe I have it in sweet delusion, and wherever a tree is in bloom it's mine, and wherever a pig eats acorns it eats them in my woods.

And so, this way, I'm rich. But I'm even richer in the hay harvest, at reaping time, in glad autumn. I say: 'Come along now everybody, anyone who likes, and mow and reap and cut the grapes! I have had my pleasure of all this, refreshed my heart with all the scents, with all the beauty. The rest is yours. Take it home with you.'

S'isch wor, Her Jäck, i ha kei eigene Baum,
i ha kei Huus, i ha kei Schof im Stal,
kei Pflueg im Feld, kei Immestand im Hoff,
kei Chatz, kei Hüenli, mengmol au kei Geld.
'S macht nüt. 'S isch doch im ganze Dorf kei Buur
so rich as ich. Der wüsset wie me's macht.
Me meint, me heigs. So meini au, i heigs
im süesse Wahn, und wo ne Bäumli blüeiht,
's isch mi, und wo ne Feld voll Ähri schwankt,
's isch au mi; wo ne Säuli Eichle frisst,
es frisst sie us mim Wald.

So bin i rich. Doch richer bin i no
im Heuet, in der Erndt, im frohe Herbst.
I sag: Jez chömmer Lüt, wer will und mag,
und heuet, schnidet, hauet Trübli ab!
I ha mi Freud an allem gha, mi Herze
an alle Düften, aller Schöni g'labt.
Was übrig isch, isch euer. Tragets heim.

Hebel's poem reminds me of many passages by Thoreau, e.g. this from Walden:

Why, the owner does not know it for many years when a poet has put his farm in rhyme, the most admirable kind of invisible fence, has fairly impounded it, milked it, skimmed it, and got all the cream, and left the farmer only the skimmed milk.