Austrian by birth, Georg Trakl (1887-1914) is noted for his unmistakable voice, his facility in both meter and free verse, and the unsettling quality of poems that occupy a liminal space between dream and nightmare. Both pharmacist and drug-user, he served as a medical officer during World War I. Emotionally devastated after struggling to care for over ninety wounded soldiers after the Battle of Grodek, he died of a drug overdose while under psychiatric care. Gedichte, published in 1913, was the only collection that Trakl published in his lifetime. Other volumes appeared posthumously.