An Anthology of Czechoslovak Literature/Song of Sun, Earth, Waters and Secret of Fire
Song of Sun, Earth, Waters and Secret of Fire
Crackled, molten with approaching fire-glow of day!
On pallid faces was kindled splendour of blood
And drunken with scaling the summit, the heart was chanting its song
Of sun, earth, waters and secret of fire.
Rigid, but in illusion approaching! Rigid, but in illusion departing!
Casting and feeding on shadows! Dallying with night-time!
Silent art thou!
Dost thou remember that outcry, borne throughout ages,
When life at the first was astir, perplexed by thy radiance,
And rigidly bowed in ecstasy of amazement was reeling from darkness?
When burden of thy smile roused winds of earth and souls
And when a myriad ethereal wings, held fast by gleam of thy lustre
Beat at thy lattice, resounding as unseen harp-strings?
And when through stillness of forests uprooted, ages of expectation,
Flew the first mournful tune, craving deliverance,
And in love and thirsting chanted thine annals,
Glittering Captive-Holder,
Thyself in captivity!
Shackled by prompting of an eternal glance, that by day encompassed with radiance
Opens itself at nightfall and in greenish depths phosphoresces,
And rigid in an unknown motion is suddenly aflash with myriad sparks,
And haunts thine every movement amid thy dance through spaces of worlds!
Vessel, enchanted within a single circle, thou floatest through ages,
And hours, perplexingly silent mariners,
Guard thy numberless strangers,
Yearningly from the deck gazing into distances
In treachery musing on liberation;
Age upon age in a single circle through ages thou floatest,
But billows thou flingest in a myriad circles surge up to the marges
Of dawning years.
Treacherous, ye that have kissed life in a thousand kisses,
And captivity of earth ye concealed with beauty, and ye at noon-tides have been
Bath and wine of the sun, and thousandfold heaved by its ardour,
Afresh and afresh ye returned for solace of earth!
From roses and violets and dew ye wove fragrant garb of mornings,
And enticed to yourselves with gazes and flashes;
The poet, who roves by your marges,
In dizziness of your thirst-ridden depths,
Amid your stillness waxes drunken with grievous remembrance of ages,
When breath of the Highest above you was lifted,
And your storm is to him the recoil of a fashioning gesture,
Which soared from pole unto pole,
Fateful upraising of a seed-strewing hand.
For amid your depths through ages have slumbered images of plants yet to be,
Glacial vegetations of winds on a captive’s casements,
And ere upon earth, in your billows, forests have murmured, spring-tides have chimed,
Berries proclaimed their brief sweetness and fragrance in whisper of blossoms,
Vain kisses of beings have seethed, tears glowed in lustre,
And the unborn sobbed in their final strivings.
Lustrous emblem of the Omnipresent!
Haughty outbreathing of potence! Embraces transformed into radiance!
Stretching aloft!
Illusion of hues sunk into a single flaring!
Tongues aglitter above heads of the holy!
Gardens of flames, hidden in depths of matter,
Blooming in splendour of changes from seen unto unseen!
Lo, souls of the strong wander in your avenues with their adoration,
And like a love-song resounds unto them whispering of your gladness,
Flames, friends of a new-risen tempest!
Conquerors kindle in you their touches for dawning of years to be,
And sorrow of thousands roves there, and plucks your blood-red, quivering blossoms,
And gathers with naked hands from their glowing crown the leafage, as from roses,
And casts them, transmuted to lustre and fragrance
Upon the pathway of souls.
Polar Winds (1897)
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, 1931. The longest-living author of this work died in 1929, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 96 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, 1931. 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 55 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 |
