An Anthology of Czechoslovak Literature/The Hideous Spectre
The Hideous Spectre
So say the justices of the golden city,
So says the sage leader of the people,
Patriot ladies shake their dainty heads,
So say Rothschild and Gutman, Count Larys and Vlček,
And his Lordship Marquis Géro,—
When from the throng of the seventy thousand
I rose up aloft. So did they smite me with a whip!
Like the Vítkovice foundries my one eye glared down,
From my shoulders fluttered a blood-stained gown.
Upon one I bore a German school,
Upon the other I bore the Polish church,
In my right hand the heavy hammer I bore
—My left was struck off by a boulder of coal,
My eye was scorched out by the blaze of a flame—
And in my heart were the curses and hatred of seventy thousand.
God knows, I am hideous!
From me the stench of a corpse is wafted,
Upon hand, upon foot, my flesh is bursting;
Knowest thou the forges at Baška? Thus my eye glares down,
From my shoulders flutters a blood-stained gown,
In my right hand the pitman’s hammer I bear,
My left was struck of by a boulder of coal,
My eye was scorched out by the blaze of a flame—
Upon my back squat a hundred murderers from Modrá
—Like savage rats they gnaw into my neck—
Upon my hips squat a hundred Jews from Polská,—
Jeer ye, my God, jeer ye! Such my array,
I Petr Bezruč, Bezruč of Těšín,
Bard of an enslaved nation.
How do the youth of Vltava maltreat a captive flittermouse?
How did the Romans upraise Spartacus, the leader?
Thus shall I stand,—long since have perished my nation,—
A hundred years shall I stand with my brow upraised to the skyline,
With my smitten neck shall I touch the azure,
I, Petr Bezruč, Ahasuerus of the Czech conscience,
Hideous phantom and bard of a bygone nation.
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.
Public domainPublic domainfalsefalse |
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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 |
