Juliusz
Słowacki
Master, my heart is sore. Your radiant West
Pours out its rainbows for me, while your deep
Blue waters quench the star that burns in quest
Of everlasting sleep
Yet though you gild the skyline, sea and shore,
Master, my heart is sore.
Erect, like empty husks of corn, I am
Void of both pleasure and satiety.
Greeting a stranger, I can still seem calm
Though silent as this sky.
In front of you I must say something more.
Master, my heart is sore.
Petulant as an infant when his mother
Leaves him alone, I see the sky grow red.
Its last beams rise from water as I smother
The tear I almost shed.
Though dawn will bring fresh daylight as before,
Master, my heart is sore.
Today I watched, wedged in the blue air,
A convoy of storks, and they were flying
A hundred miles from land, still more to where
This long low land is lying.
I've seen storks race across my native moor.
Master, my heart is sore.
Since I have meditated much on death,
Since I have seldom known a home, since I
Am a poor pilgrim, trudging, out of breath,
And lightning scars the sky
Since time still keeps my unknown grave in store,
Master, my heart is sore.
Perhaps my skeleton will whiten and
No gravestone cast its solemn shadow there,
I shall still grudge each corpse the plot of land
That keeps it safe from air.
My bed will be as restless as it's poor.
Master, my heart is sore.
At home a child will pray for me each day
Just as he has been told. And yet I know
That, as it sails, this ship takes me away,
A mile each mile we go.
And since his prayers cannot the child restore,
Master, my heart is sore.
A hundred years from now some other men
Will watch the rainbows that your angels hew
Across the starry vastness - but by then
They will be dying too.
I reach out toward the nothing at my core.
Master, my heat is sore.
Composed at sea off Alexandria.
Translated by Jerzy Peterkiewicz and Burns Singer
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