La Raison

Le Loup et l'Agneau

par Jean de la Fontaine

La raison du plus fort est toujours la meilleure :
Nous l'allons montrer tout à l'heure.
Un Agneau se désaltérait
Dans le courant d'une onde pure.
Un Loup survient à jeun qui cherchait aventure,
Et que la faim en ces lieux attirait.
Qui te rend si hardi de troubler mon breuvage ?
Dit cet animal plein de rage :
Tu seras châtié de ta témérité.
- Sire, répond l'Agneau, que votre Majesté
Ne se mette pas en colère ;
Mais plutôt qu'elle considère
Que je me vas désaltérant
Dans le courant,
Plus de vingt pas au-dessous d'Elle,
Et que par conséquent, en aucune façon,
Je ne puis troubler sa boisson.
- Tu la troubles, reprit cette bête cruelle,
Et je sais que de moi tu médis l'an passé.
- Comment l'aurais-je fait si je n'étais pas né ?
Reprit l'Agneau, je tette encor ma mère.
- Si ce n'est toi, c'est donc ton frère.
- Je n'en ai point. - C'est donc quelqu'un des tiens :
Car vous ne m'épargnez guère,
Vous, vos bergers, et vos chiens.
On me l'a dit : il faut que je me venge.
Là-dessus, au fond des forêts
Le Loup l'emporte, et puis le mange,
Sans autre forme de procès.

Still Have

Mihai Eminescu - 1883

Still have a single sigh:
In silence of the night
I beg to let me die
Near sea at the low tide;
And let my sleep be calm
And forests be nearby,
On stretched waters' balm
I'll have the clearest sky
I don’t need any flags,
Don’t want a coffin rich,
Just plait for me a rug
From the trees’ youngest branches.

And no one needs to weep
Or show the smallest grief,
Just let the autumn speak
With wet and falling leaves.
And while with noise sway
The springs among the cliffs,
The Moon will slip away
On the long tops of firs.
The cowbells pierce near sea
The colder evening wind,
My holy linden tree
Above will start to swing.

As i won’t wander off
Since then for evermore,
My memories, with love
Will snow on me galore
The Morning-Evening Stars
As then will be my friends,
Through branches of the firs
Would smile at me again.
Will moan with all the hurts
The ocean’s coarse caress...
As i will become dirt
In my last loneliness.

Towards The Star

first published: 1886, by Mihai Eminescu

Towards the star that rose tonight
There is a path so long,
That thousands years it took its light
To come to us along.

Maybe for long time it was spent
In depth of heaven's blue,
And only now its ray was meant
To shine in our view.

The icon of the star deceased
Dawns slowly in the night
When it was there, unseen, we missed,
We see it when it's not.

The same way when our greatest wish
Died down in depth of night
The light of our love dismissed,
Still follows in our sight.

Song Of A Young Miner

Otilia Valeria Coman

Today i floated, lover, on greater bluish waters,
So you can squeeze the shirt that moulded on my spine,
And on the waters i have been thinking of our hearts,
But you've been calling - can turn me any time!
And then, i came back from the waters,
And here is my proof - a handful of shells.

Today i roamed, my lover, through forests deep and seas,
The hidden paths were tearing the clothes i had on me.
And in the big woods i have been thinking of our eyes,
But you've been calling - your call went right through me;
And then, i came back from the big woods,
And here is my proof - a handful of leaves.

Today i lost me, lover, through big layers of time
From my face wipe me, lover, the dark and my years too,
It almost seemed i walked millennia with you,
But you've been calling - your voice came faint to me
And i got scared i won't be back in time,
And started pushing forward the piles big of time
Towards the future - and here i am at you.

I Am Radical

by Adrian Păunescu - Aug, 1, 1988

I am radical
more precisely
i am for keeping
of a right balance
between lie and truth,
between heroes and heroes
between plus and minus,
i am radical,
more precisely,
i am getting sick of the socialist demagogy
more than
of the bourgeois demagogy
because i feel it
pressing from much closer.

I am radical,
i think it is not good, the law
that punishes you more severely
if you kill a bear
than if you kill a man,
and even more,
punishes you more severely
if you speak,
if you have opinions,
than if you kill.

I am radical,
that is i imagine
if the equation
"the people have chosen us
we speak in the name of the people,
we govern in the name of the people,
we build the socialism
with the people and for the people,"
is true,
it is not right
to destroy of the man
his house, his town or village,
without asking the man;
ten students have declared at school,
when the teacher asked them
what good deeds have they done,

in that day,
they helped an old woman
cross the street
but why so many,
the teacher wondered
because the old woman
didn't want to cross the street
they answered.

About this would be the situation
i am radical
and i look in the face,
if the old woman doesn't want to cross the street
it is difficult
to sell yourself
best among others
because you force her to cross,
and things are just like this
the old woman doesn't want
to cross the street.
the old woman is not on the street,
there isn't even a street,
and the old woman isn't even old
but just a nervous country
that would have to cross.

I am radical,
that is i am terrified
by the remorses
that can not save anything anymore
especially the life
that stubborns anyway
for the past few generations
to go to hell.

I am radical
i like prunes, peaches,
summer apples, freedom,
the woman, the historical frontiers,
and incense flavored grapes.

I am radical,
i could dictate a poem
even from a public phone,
but i am radical also
if i mention that
i could do this
only if the one
to whom i dictate
would have a phone.

I am radical,
i believe that Marshall Ion Antonescu
if he would be re-judged
by an impartial tribunal
would be declared
without hesitation,
hero post mortem of Romania
and universal martyr
at least after the reading
of the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact.

I am radical,
i believe in the value of cabbage leaf
applied in painful areas
of the body.

I am radical
i don't believe it exists
a more ugly angel
and a more beautiful demon
than man
and, even more that that,
i don't believe it exists
a more fruitful accident
and a more contradictory law
than man.

From myself
and from the others
i extract the square root
and i realize it is only water,
water in a state of thought,
water with soul and whirls,
water, in an incurable
chemical formula.

I am radical,
when it rains
and when it snows
and when they talk about me,
about the water that i am,
about the water that i am.

click me!

Love Poem

by Ana Blandiana

we each carry only one love in us
but mine is for you and yours... for another.
and fire consumes both of us
but i burn for you and you... for another
i wait for a word, you wait for a word
but me from you and you... from another.
i see in your sleep your face ravishing
but you in your dream still see the other...
and what still remains when destiny knows just
to part us?
don't you have pity? we just live to love, although you another
but i still... you!

Silence

by Lucian Blaga - 1924

There's so much silence in the air i think i hear
the moon rays hitting in the windows.

Inside
a foreign voice awoke
and sings a song of wish
that isn't mine.

They say the ancestors who died without age,
with young blood still in veins,
with passions left in blood,
with living Sun in passions,
come,
come to live again
in us
their unlived life.

There's so much silence in the air i think i hear
the moon rays hitting in the windows.

Oh, who knows - soul, in what chest you will sing
you too again over the ages
on chords of silence sweet,
of harp of darkness, choked desires
and broken joy of living? Who knows?
Who knows?

The Earth

by Lucian Blaga - 1919

On our back we were lying in the grass: you and i.
The sky melted like wax in the burning of the Sun
flowing along the fields like a river.
Pressing silence was mastering the Earth
and a question fell through my soul to its bottom.

Wouldn't have to tell
anything the Earth? All this-Earth
unforgivingly large and killingly mute,
nothing?

To better hear it i pressed my ear
Against the ground - doubtful and obedient -
And from underground i heard
your heart's noisy beat.

The Earth was answering.

Gloss

by Mihai Eminescu - 1883

Time is passing, time is coming,
All are old and all are new;
What is right and what is wrong
Ask yourself and reason too;
Don't you hope and don't go fretting,
What is wave like wave is gone;
If it's tempting, if it's calling,
You remain as cold as stone.

Many happen right before us,
In our ears the sound of many,
We remember more or less
If we ever listen any?...
You stay put or step aside,
Yourself rediscovering,
When with senseless noise in flight
Time is passing time is coming.

Don't you let the needle leaving
The cold reason's balance center
For an instant that is changing
For the happiness's cover,
Which from its own death is born
For an instant in our view;
To who knows no need to warn
All are old and all are new.

Watchful as to a vaudeville
Find yourself in the big world:
May someone play even devil,
You will guess him afterwards,
If they're crying, if they fight,
In your corner stand alone
Understanding from their art
What is right and what is wrong.

From the past the future fathom
Of the same page are two sides,
See the next top at the bottom
Those who learn to read them right;
All that's been or yet to come
In the present we have too,
But of meaningless of them
Ask yourself and reason too.

Cause to same old means are subject
All the things that still exist,
And since old times to the present
World is happy, world is triste;
Other masks, the same old story,
Other voices, the same setting,
For this life is illusory
Don't you hope and don't go fretting.

Don't you hope when see deceivers
Build a bridge to their success,
You'll be left behind by losers,
Even if you are the best;
Don't you fear they'll try again
To their own to brake them bones,
Don't associate with them:
What is wave like wave is gone.

With the sweet song of a mermaid
World is whirling shiny nets
To change actors in the setting
Pulling you like a magnet;
Sneak aside and run away,
Without even noticing,
From your distant path away
If it's tempting if it's calling.

If they laugh you step aside,
If they curse you shut your mouth;
What you want with your advice,
If you see they're way too loud;
Let them say what they will say
Let them pass and let begone;
If the world has gone astray
You remain as cold as stone.

You remain as cold as stone,
If it's tempting, if it's calling:
What is wave like wave is gone,
Don't you hope and don't go fretting;
Ask yourself and reason too
What is right and what is wrong;
All are old and all are new:
Time is passing, time is coming.



Translator's note:

Very few or only those who ever tried know what a huge effort is to translate a poem and try to keep the same words while making them rhyme and rhythm. But translating from real poets is not as difficult because their language is bound towards universality, on a secret, karmic level. If only the translator can put aside the emotional charge involved with translating from the greatest.

The form of this translation, especially the number of syllables in each verse, is not perfect, as the original in Romanian, but i did my best trying to build an intercultural bridge.

Do You Remember The Beach?

by Ana Blandiana

Do you remember the beach
Covered with bitter shivers
On which
We couldn't walk barefoot?
The way you were looking at the sea
Pretending listening me?
Do you remember
The hysterical gulls
Wheeling in the ringing
Of the unseen bells of a church
Celebrations with fish,
The way in which
You were furthering running
Towards the sea
And yelling you needed
The distance
So you just can see me
The snowing
Was dimming
Mixed with birds in the water
With almost joyful despair
Was watching
The tracks of your feet in the sea
And the sea
Was closing like an eyelid
Over the eye in which i was waiting.

The Only Thing That Matters

by Lucian Avramescu

the woman is the only thing that matters
and i affirm this knowing that plenty
would raise their eyebrows...
her skin knows all the languages of the universal happiness,
glued to her, like to the earth,
i understand constellations, heaven and hell,
joy and sorrow;
the walking through myself
does me better and better
not to speak anymore
about the architecture of self or the one
that makes dim all the great cathedrals of the world
San Pedro, The Dome of Milan...

the woman is the only thing that matters
with her body in your arms
you can cross an ocean
even if you don't know how to swim
except in the waters of her eyes

without woman
our limo is only a broken carriage
and the bank account is smaller even if gets bigger
the friends are
full of the fever of treason
tapdoles are swimming in the most expensive wine

oh ay
the robin is singing in the top of your bosom
you happily dress in prison's clothes
like you were going to a wedding
count the coins on the sky
like a universal nabob
even if the wind is blowing through your social buttonholes:
the train runs over you
and a whisper, if left whole
follows the letters of her name
ready to weave plans for the future
when nearby a luxury morgue is lurking

the woman, gentlemen, is the only thing
that cannot be replaced except by its own self
her skin knows all the languages
of the universal happiness,
the circle of illusions
is her currency
through which we win the world crises
that's why i believe
her science
to make us happy and unhappy
gives you the title of
doctor honoris causa
of our complicated soul algebra.

the woman, gentlemen - not to bother you anymore -
the woman with her skin
which teaches us the alphabet of the blind,
with her always up side down cups of her breasts
in which we never read anything
the woman
with all the silverware of her smile
or her bareness that fills the universe
is the only thing that matters
gentlemen

The Actors

by Marin Sorescu

The most daring - the actors!
With their sleeves rolled up
They really know how to live (for) us!
Never seen a more perfect kiss
Like of the actors in the third act,
When sentiments start to clarify

Their death on the scene is so natural,
That compared to its perfection,
Those in graveyards,
The real dead,
Tragically, forever dead,
They seem to move!

And us, still in our only life!
Not even this one know how to live.
Talking small or being silent for years,
Embarrassed and unaesthetic,
And (we) don't know where the hell to keep our hands.

If I’m Not Asking Too Much

By Marin Sorescu

- What would you take with you

If you had an opportunity
To commute daily between heaven and hell
Just to teach some classes?

- A book, a bottle of wine and a woman, Lord,
If i’m not asking too much.

- You are asking too much, We’ll take the woman.
She would talk too much,
Fill your head with small things,
And you wouldn’t have the time to prepare your classes.

- Lord, i beg of You, take my book,
I will write it myself, if i had beside me
A bottle of wine and a woman.
That’s what i wish, if i’m not asking too much.

- You are asking too much.

- What would you take with you

If you had an opportunity

To commute daily, between heaven and hell

Just to teach some classes?

- A bottle of wine and a woman, Lord,

If i’m not asking too much.

- You’ve asked that before, why are you stubborn?

It is too much, I told you, We take the woman.

- What do You have with her, why so much persecution?

Better take my wine,

It softens me and i couldn’t prepare my classes,

Getting inspiration from the eyes of my lover.

Silence, long minutes,

Maybe even eternities,

Letting me time for forgetting.

- What would you take with you

If you had an opportunity

To commute daily between heaven and hell

To teach some classes?

- A woman, Lord,

If i’m not asking too much.

- You are asking too much, We’ll take the woman.

- Then better take my classes,

Take my heaven and hell,

All or nothing,

I would commute between heaven and hell for no reason.

How could i scare and frighten the sinners in hell

If i didn’t have the woman, as teaching material, to show them?

How could i uplift the right ones in heaven,

If i didn’t have the book to translate to them?

How could i stand the trip and the differences

In temperature, luminosity and pressure

Between heaven and hell

If i didn’t have the wine to give me the courage?

The Wheel

By Marin Sorescu

I live in a wheel.

I can realize it
By the trees.
Every time i look through the window
I can see them
With the leaves in the sky,
Or on the ground.

And by the birds
That fly with a wing in the south
And with a wing in the north.

And by the Sun
That today rises in my left eye,
And tomorrow in the right one.

And by me
Who sometimes i am
And sometimes i am not anymore.

Eminescu

Mintea lui Eminescu era ca un diamant, fiecare poezie reprezenta o faţetă.

Aprox. 1975

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