Poets Translate Poets: A Hudson Review Anthology (30 page)

But if you want a man, I’ve never seen

A fi ner specimen than this Ramin:

What use is beauty if it doesn’t bless

Your life with pleasure and love’s happiness?

You’re innocent, you’re in the dark about it,

You don’t know how forlorn life is without it.

Women were made for men, dear Vis, and you

Are not exempt, whatever you might do.

Th

e well-born women of the world delight

In marrying a courtier or a knight,

And some, who have a husband, also see

A special friend who’s sworn to secrecy;

She loves her husband, she embraces him,

And then her happy friend replaces him.

You can have royal riches beyond measure,

Brocades, and jewels, and every kind of treasure,

But joy is something that you won’t discover

Until you have a husband or a lover.

If you need riches it’s to make you more

Attractive to him than you were before;

What use are all your red and yellow dresses

Unless they lead to kisses and caresses?

If you can see this, it was wrong of you

To slander me when all I said is true;

I spoke maternally, and as your nurse,

I’m trying to make things better now, not worse.

Ramin is worthy of you, and I’ve seen

Th

at you, dear Vis, are worthy of Ramin:

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Pe r s i a n

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You are the sun and he’s the moon; if he

Is like an elegant, tall cypress tree,

You are a bough of blossoms in the spring;

If you are milk, he’s wine. In everything

You’re worthy of each other’s love, and I

Will never grieve again until I die

If I can see love mutually requited

When you and he are happily united.”

And as the nurse spoke, at her voice’s sound,

A horde of devil’s demons crowded round,

And set a thousand traps, a thousand snares

Before her feet, to catch Vis unawares.

Th

e nurse went on: “A noble woman spends

Her life in pleasure, with her special friends

Or with her husband; you sit here and sigh,

And weep your heart away, and moan and cry.

Your youth will soon be gone, and you’ll have had

No time at all when you were young and glad;

How long will you stay grieving and alone?

You’re not composed of brass, my dear, or stone.”

And gradually the heart of Vis was stirred

And soft ened by the arguments she heard:

She felt herself assent, but did not let

Her tongue bear witness to her heart as yet.

Vis and Ramin then swore no force could sever

Th

e love that bound the two of them forever.

Ramin spoke fi rst: “I swear by God, and by

His sovereignty that rules the earth and sky,

I swear now by the sun, and by the light

Th

e shining moon bestows on us at night,

I swear by Venus and by noble Jupiter,

I swear by bread and salt and fl ickering fi re,

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I swear by faith and God’s omnipotence,

And by the soul and all its eloquence,

Th

at while winds scour the wastelands and the mountains,

While waters fl ow in rivers and in fountains,

While night has darkness, and while streams have fi shes,

While stars have courses, and while souls have wishes,

Ramin will not regret his love, or break

Th

e binding oath that he and Vis now make,

He’ll never take another love, or cease

To give his heart exclusively to Vis.”

Vis promised love when Prince Ramin had spoken

And swore her promises would not be broken.

She gave him violets then and murmured, “Take

Th

is pretty posy, keep it for my sake,

Keep it forever, so that when you see

Fresh violets blooming you’ll remember me.

May any one who breaks our promise bow

And wither as these purple fl owers do now,

And when I see the spring’s new fl owers appear

I will recall the oaths we swore to here;

May any soul that breaks this oath decay

And shrivel as fresh fl owers do—in a day.”

And once these promises of love were given,

And they had called to witness God and heaven,

Th

ey lay beside each other telling tales

Of all their former sorrows and travails.

Vis lay beside her prince now, face to face,

Th

e full moon lay in Prince Ramin’s embrace,

And when Ramin aff ectionately placed

His gentle arm about her yielding waist

It was as if a golden torque should grasp

A silver cypress in its circling clasp,

And then Rezvan himself could not declare

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Which was the lovelier of this noble pair.

Th

eir pillow smelt of musk, and jeweled bed-covers

Bestrewed with roses lay upon the lovers.

Now lip to lip and cheek to cheek they lay

And struck the ball of pleasure into play;

So close together were their bodies pressed

Th

at rain could not have reached to either’s breast,

And Vis’s heart was now a balm that cured

Th

e agonies Ramin’s heart had endured,

For every wound she’d dealt his heart before

He kissed her face a thousand times and more.

Now happiness emboldened him, and he

Placed in the lock of pleasure longing’s key,

And felt his joy and eagerness increase

As he discerned the virgin seal of Vis;

Ramin pressed on and pierced this precious pearl,

And Vis was now a woman, not a girl.

When he withdrew the arrow, blood was seen

On wounded Vis, and on her prince, Ramin,

But though Ramin had wounded her she knew

A heartfelt pleasure and contentment too;

And now that their desire was satisfi ed

Th

eir love grew deeper and intensifi ed.

So for two months of luxury and leisure

Th

ey gave themselves to happiness and pleasure.

Dick Davis, 2007

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P o l i s h

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Zbignie w Her bert
(1924–98)

Arion

Th

is is he—Arion—

the Grecian Caruso

concertmaster of the ancient world

expensive as a necklace

or rather as a constellation

singing

to the ocean billows and the traders in silks

to the tyrants and mule herders

Th

e crowns blacken on the tyrants’ heads

and the sellers of onion cakes

for the fi rst time err in their fi gures to their own disadvantage

What Arion is singing about

nobody here could say exactly

the essential thing is that he restores world harmony

the sea gently rocks the land

fi re gossips with water without hatred

in the course of one hexameter lie down

wolves and roedeer merlins and doves

and the child goes to sleep in the lion’s mane

as in a cradle

Look how the animals are smiling

People are living on white fl owers

and everything is just as good

as it was in the beginning

Th

is is he—Arion

expensive and multiple

the author of giddiness

standing in a blizzard of pictures

he has eight fi ngers like an octave

and he sings

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Until from the blue in the west

the luminous threads of saff ron unravel themselves

which indicate that night is coming close

Arion with a friendly shake of his head

says good-bye to

the mule herders and tyrants

the shopkeepers and philosophers

and takes his seat upon the back

of his tame dolphin

—I’ll be seeing you—

How handsome Arion is

—say all the girls—

when he fl oats out to sea

alone

with a garland of horizons on his head

To Marcus Aurelius

For Prof. Henryk Eizenberg

Good night Marcus put out the light

and shut the book For overhead

is raised a gold alarm of stars

while heaven talks some foreign speech

this the barbarian cry of fear

your Latin cannot understand

Terror continuous dark terror

against the fragile human land

begins to beat It’s winning Hear

its roar Th

e unrelenting stream

of elements will drown your prose

until the world’s four walls go down

As for us?—to tremble in the air

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blow in the ashes stir the ether

gnaw our fi ngers seek vain words

and drag the fallen shades behind us

Well Marcus better hang up your peace

give me your hand across the dark

Let it tremble when the blind world beats

on senses fi ve like a failing lyre

Traitors—universe and astronomy

reckoning of stars wisdom of grass

and your greatness too immense

and Marcus my defenseless tears

Maturity

It’s good what happened

it’s good what’s going to happen

even what’s happening right now

it’s o.k.

In a nest pleated from the fl esh

there lived a bird

its wings beat about the heart

we mostly called it: unrest

and sometimes: love

evenings

we went along the rushing sorrow river

in the river one could see oneself

from head to toe

now

the bird has fallen to the bottom of the clouds

the river has sunk into the sand

helpless as children

and practised as old men

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we

are—simply—free

that is—ready to withdraw

In the night a nice old man arrives

and coaxes us with a deprecating shrug

—who are you?—we ask alarmedly

—Seneca—say the ones who fi nished grammar school

and those who aren’t familiar with Latin

just call me: the deceased

Th

e Wringer

Th

e inquisitors are in our midst. Th

ey live in vast subterranean houses and

only the shop-sign WRINGER HERE betrays their presence.

Tables with fl exed bronze muscles, powerful rollers, crushing slowly but

with precision, a driving-wheel, which knows no mercy—are waiting for us.

Th

e sheets, which they carry out of the wringer-shop, are like empty

bodies of magicians and heretics.

Episode in a Library

A blonde girl is bent over a poem. With a stiletto-sharp pencil she transfers

the words to a sheet of paper and changes them into stresses, accents,

caesuras. Th

e lament of a fallen poet now looks like a salamander eaten

away by ants.

When we carried him away under machine-gun fi re, I believed that his

still warm body would fi nd its resurrection in his words. Now, as I watch

the death of the words, I know there is no limit to decay. All that will be left aft er us in the black earth will be the dissipated sounds. Th

e accents over

nothingness and dust.

Peter Dale Scott, 1963

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P o r t u g u e s e

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Pero M eogo
(Th

irteenth Century)

“He goes, my lover,”

He goes, my lover,

With the love I have given,

Like a wounded deer

Before the king’s huntsman.

He goes, my lover,

With my love, mother,

Like a wounded deer

Before the tall hunter.

Down to the sea he will go

And die of his wound;

Th

at way will my lover go

If I let him leave my mind.

—Have a care, daughter;

Th

ere was one such, lately,

Who showed great desire