An Anthology of Czechoslovak Literature/I
For other English-language translations of this work, see I.
I
I
I AM the seer of the folk by the Bezkyds;
God gave me not to them. He heeds but the country
Where gold of the corn stretches up to the skyline,
Where pansies are fragrant, forget-me-nots blossom,
Where cymbal and fiddle make music for dances,
Where cities are broad and castles majestic,
Treasure-filled churches and skiffs on the river,
Where men trust in heaven, and gladness abounds.
God gave me not to them. He heeds but the country
Where gold of the corn stretches up to the skyline,
Where pansies are fragrant, forget-me-nots blossom,
Where cymbal and fiddle make music for dances,
Where cities are broad and castles majestic,
Treasure-filled churches and skiffs on the river,
Where men trust in heaven, and gladness abounds.
He whom God had condemned to a sulphury chasm,
He whose lips in their starkness no prayer ever uttered,
Sat on a crag with a time-old defiance.
He whose lips in their starkness no prayer ever uttered,
Sat on a crag with a time-old defiance.
He stared with an eye that was murky as nightfall,
’Neath the hush of the Bezkyds and ’neath Lysá Hora.
A century’s grip, the yoke that has humbled
The collier’s neck as a bough in the bending,
Turbulent grasp of the foreigner, dragging
The vanishing speech from the lips of the children,
The sign of betrayal, of hands in entreaty,
—For a hundred years’ span his gaze it had haunted—
Stirred up the demon.
’Neath the hush of the Bezkyds and ’neath Lysá Hora.
A century’s grip, the yoke that has humbled
The collier’s neck as a bough in the bending,
Turbulent grasp of the foreigner, dragging
The vanishing speech from the lips of the children,
The sign of betrayal, of hands in entreaty,
—For a hundred years’ span his gaze it had haunted—
Stirred up the demon.
He smote at the boulder.
Down from the crag leapt the hideous prophet,
Nurtured from serfdom, from blood of betrayal;
He sobbed at the moon and he railed at the sunshine,
With a clench of his fist he threatened the heavens,
And each of the slayers, though golden their lustre,
And though at their feet were bowed down as to godheads
Yonder at Těšín the colliery bondsmen.
He dragged in the dust in his wrath and defiance,
The bounty for life that the demon had given him,—
Down from the crag leapt I!
Down from the crag leapt the hideous prophet,
Nurtured from serfdom, from blood of betrayal;
He sobbed at the moon and he railed at the sunshine,
With a clench of his fist he threatened the heavens,
And each of the slayers, though golden their lustre,
And though at their feet were bowed down as to godheads
Yonder at Těšín the colliery bondsmen.
He dragged in the dust in his wrath and defiance,
The bounty for life that the demon had given him,—
Down from the crag leapt I!
II
IN August, when sunrays are ruddy and slanting,
When spurtings of heat ooze out from the boulders,
The Morávka torrent is parched in its courses,
Below are uplifted the arms of the miners,
The blacksmiths are pounding the iron in its redness.
On the span of the fields at Krásná, at Pražma,
Women bow down in the glow of the sunshine.
I roused myself up from this peaceable people,
Even whose cradle was guarded by serfdom,
Even whose childhood was fettered by bondage,
Ill-plighted scion of miners and blacksmiths;
I sped me from Ostrava, Vitkovice, Baška,
From Frydlant, from Orlová, Dombrová, Lazy,
I flung in the pit my hammer and mattock,
I left in the field my mother and sister,
I snatched from its hook my grandfather’s fiddle,
My tune I began.
IN August, when sunrays are ruddy and slanting,
When spurtings of heat ooze out from the boulders,
The Morávka torrent is parched in its courses,
Below are uplifted the arms of the miners,
The blacksmiths are pounding the iron in its redness.
On the span of the fields at Krásná, at Pražma,
Women bow down in the glow of the sunshine.
I roused myself up from this peaceable people,
Even whose cradle was guarded by serfdom,
Even whose childhood was fettered by bondage,
Ill-plighted scion of miners and blacksmiths;
I sped me from Ostrava, Vitkovice, Baška,
From Frydlant, from Orlová, Dombrová, Lazy,
I flung in the pit my hammer and mattock,
I left in the field my mother and sister,
I snatched from its hook my grandfather’s fiddle,
My tune I began.
Once, haply, resounded
Strains of delight from it, youth and affection.
I know not, I know not. ’Tis long ago, now,
Three strings were rended.
Strains of delight from it, youth and affection.
I know not, I know not. ’Tis long ago, now,
Three strings were rended.
I flung from the church the foreigner’s preacher,
From the foreigner’s school I harried the master;
By night I enkindled my woods they had taken;
I slaughtered the hare on my overlord’s moorland.
They dragged me to Těšín, God tangled my senses.
‘Neath Lysá I play to the goats and the squirrels,
Beneath the red ash-tree to sparrows that perch there.
From hamlet to hamlet in heat I have wandered,
In heat and in cold, in blizzard and rainfall.
I have played behind hedges and played beneath windows;
Only a single string has my fiddle,
The heavy sigh of the seventy thousand,
That have perished ‘neath Lysá, hard by Bohumín;
They have perished amid their wrenched-away pinewoods,
In the wrenched-away Bezkyds slowly they perish,
They in Šumbark have perished, in Lutyň have perished,
In Datyně perish, in Dětmarovice,
They in Poremba perished, they in Dombrová perish.
Strike ye your tents and quench ye your watchfires!
A stirring has come o’er the seventy thousand;
Long ago on the Olza was pitched an encampment,
Far have we yielded beyond the Lucina,
We shall cross to the Morava, beyond the Ostravice,
A nation of silence, a stock that is gone.
From the foreigner’s school I harried the master;
By night I enkindled my woods they had taken;
I slaughtered the hare on my overlord’s moorland.
They dragged me to Těšín, God tangled my senses.
‘Neath Lysá I play to the goats and the squirrels,
Beneath the red ash-tree to sparrows that perch there.
From hamlet to hamlet in heat I have wandered,
In heat and in cold, in blizzard and rainfall.
I have played behind hedges and played beneath windows;
Only a single string has my fiddle,
The heavy sigh of the seventy thousand,
That have perished ‘neath Lysá, hard by Bohumín;
They have perished amid their wrenched-away pinewoods,
In the wrenched-away Bezkyds slowly they perish,
They in Šumbark have perished, in Lutyň have perished,
In Datyně perish, in Dětmarovice,
They in Poremba perished, they in Dombrová perish.
Strike ye your tents and quench ye your watchfires!
A stirring has come o’er the seventy thousand;
Long ago on the Olza was pitched an encampment,
Far have we yielded beyond the Lucina,
We shall cross to the Morava, beyond the Ostravice,
A nation of silence, a stock that is gone.
As David in front of the ark, so before them
Like a mad snake to the sound of the reed-pipe,
Doth dance the quaint bard of the seventy thousand,
The Bezkyd Don Quixote, with juniper spearshaft,
Armour of moss and a helmet of pine-cones,
A mushroom for shield, and he peeps from the spinney,
Eager to seize on the stern arm of judgment,
The knight’s tawny sword in the golden-wrought corselet.
Like a mad snake to the sound of the reed-pipe,
Doth dance the quaint bard of the seventy thousand,
The Bezkyd Don Quixote, with juniper spearshaft,
Armour of moss and a helmet of pine-cones,
A mushroom for shield, and he peeps from the spinney,
Eager to seize on the stern arm of judgment,
The knight’s tawny sword in the golden-wrought corselet.
I, Petr Bezruč, the Bezruč of Těšín,
Vagabond fiddler and piper of madness,
Lunatic rebel, and drunken songster,
Ill-omened owl on the turret of Těšín,
I play and I sing, while the hammers make thunder
From Vitkovice, Frydlant, and under Lipiny.
Around are rich men of a faith that I know not,
—O Petr Bezruč, how lovest thou them!—
Men who have names that are lordly and peerless,
Haughty as stars and lustrous as godheads;
—O Petr Bezruč, who shattered your home,—
Around there are women in velvet, in satin;
Around there are men, glorified, mighty,
In the city of gold, by the side of the Danube,
Around there are poets from Vltava’s marges,
The lovers of women, as Paris has bidden.
The string in despair ’neath the bow is aquiver,
The heavy sigh of the seventy thousand;
I sing to the stones and I play to the boulders,
I play and I sing,—will ye give me a kreutzer?
Vagabond fiddler and piper of madness,
Lunatic rebel, and drunken songster,
Ill-omened owl on the turret of Těšín,
I play and I sing, while the hammers make thunder
From Vitkovice, Frydlant, and under Lipiny.
Around are rich men of a faith that I know not,
—O Petr Bezruč, how lovest thou them!—
Men who have names that are lordly and peerless,
Haughty as stars and lustrous as godheads;
—O Petr Bezruč, who shattered your home,—
Around there are women in velvet, in satin;
Around there are men, glorified, mighty,
In the city of gold, by the side of the Danube,
Around there are poets from Vltava’s marges,
The lovers of women, as Paris has bidden.
The string in despair ’neath the bow is aquiver,
The heavy sigh of the seventy thousand;
I sing to the stones and I play to the boulders,
I play and I sing,—will ye give me a kreutzer?
III
I AM the first of the Teschen people,
First bard of the Bezkyds who uttered his strains.
Of the foreigner’s plough and his mines they are bondsmen.
Watery, milky, the sap in their veins.
Each of them has a God in the heavens,
Greater the one in their native land.
In the church they pay Him on high their tribute.
To the other with blood and a toil-seared hand.
I AM the first of the Teschen people,
First bard of the Bezkyds who uttered his strains.
Of the foreigner’s plough and his mines they are bondsmen.
Watery, milky, the sap in their veins.
Each of them has a God in the heavens,
Greater the one in their native land.
In the church they pay Him on high their tribute.
To the other with blood and a toil-seared hand.
He, He upon high, gave thee bread for thy life’s sake,
Gave flowers to the butterfly, glades to the doe;
Thou, thou who wert bred on the Bezkyd mountains,
To Him the broad lands beneath Lysá dost owe.
He gave thee the mountains and gave thee the forests,
The fragrance borne by the breeze from the dale;
At a swoop the other has taken all from thee,
Speed unto Him in yon church, and wail.
Gave flowers to the butterfly, glades to the doe;
Thou, thou who wert bred on the Bezkyd mountains,
To Him the broad lands beneath Lysá dost owe.
He gave thee the mountains and gave thee the forests,
The fragrance borne by the breeze from the dale;
At a swoop the other has taken all from thee,
Speed unto Him in yon church, and wail.
Honour God and thy masters, my son from the Bezkyds,
And this shall yield fair fruit unto thee.
Thou art chased from thy forests by guardian angels,
So humbly to them thou bendest the knee:
“Thou thief from Krásná! Is this thy timber?
Thou shalt sink down meekly, and earth shalt thou kiss!
Quit thy lord’s forests and get thee to Frýdek!”
Thou upon high, what sayst Thou to this?
And this shall yield fair fruit unto thee.
Thou art chased from thy forests by guardian angels,
So humbly to them thou bendest the knee:
“Thou thief from Krásná! Is this thy timber?
Thou shalt sink down meekly, and earth shalt thou kiss!
Quit thy lord’s forests and get thee to Frýdek!”
Thou upon high, what sayst Thou to this?
But thine ugly speech is a bane to thy masters,
To those guardian angels it is a bane.
Have done with it, thou shalt fare the better,
Thy son shall be first thereby to gain.
Thus it is. The Lord wills it. Night sank o’er my people,
We shall perish before the night has passed.
In this night, I have prayed to the Demon of Vengeance,
The first of the Bezkyd bards and the last.
To those guardian angels it is a bane.
Have done with it, thou shalt fare the better,
Thy son shall be first thereby to gain.
Thus it is. The Lord wills it. Night sank o’er my people,
We shall perish before the night has passed.
In this night, I have prayed to the Demon of Vengeance,
The first of the Bezkyd bards and the last.
This work is a translation and has a separate copyright status to the applicable copyright protections of the original content.
| Original: |
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1930. The longest-living author of this work died in 1958, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 66 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
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| Translation: |
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1930. The longest-living author of this work died in 1970, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 54 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
Public domainPublic domainfalsefalse |
