Marie Under: Poems

SPRING

4.

Now once again on us these white nights fall,
no sleep is had by heavens, land or sea,
or the expectant blood of this humanity:
desire like embers burning in the soul.

These white nights are like silver fetters, chains:
and all the scents in flowers’ silk embrace
have woken trembling in their secret place
as from afar the waters bring refrains.

Then golden hair flies streaming in the breeze
and large eyes sparkle with a secret glow –
Who wove these dreams around me in the air?

And red and redder swell my lips with ease –
No one can kiss away and make them go,
the countless kisses that have ripened there.


KEVAD

4.

Nüüd jälle tulevad need valged ööd,
kus und ei saa ei taevas, maa, ei meri,
ei inimlaste ootus-ärev veri,
kus ihad hinges hõõguvad kui söed.

Need valged ööd kui hõbevalged keed:
kõik lõhnad õite siidilises süles
on sala värisedes ärgand üles,
ja mingit kauget laulu toovad veed. 

Siis kuldseis juustes lehitsemas tuuled
ja suuris silmis salaline sära –
Kes kõik need unelmad mu ümber palmind!

Ja puna-punasemaks paisumas mu huuled –
ei suuda keegi suudelda neilt ärä,
mis lugemata suudlusi sääl sääl valmind.


 
SOMEWHERE

Over a lonely path
half bent in two I walk,
always keeping my eyes
on time’s hurrying clock.

Beside the lonely path
the last flower freezes in air.
Death reaps time and fortune,
somewhere, somewhere...

Somewhere a house is waiting
Remember it where you stand!
Endure now, endurer,
waiting somewhere is a land.

Somewhere a house is waiting,
waiting somewhere is a land –
Endure now, endurer:
the heart will not ease its demand.


KUSAGIL

Üle üksiku raja
kõnnin poolkummargil,
silmad alati aja
ruttaval osutil.

Ääres üksiku raja
külmetab viimne lill.
Surm niidab õnne ja aja
kusagil, kusagil...

Kusagil ootab üks maja –
Mäleta mäleta!
Kannata, kannataja,
kusagil ootab üks maa...

Kusagil ootab üks maja,
kusagil ootab üks maa –
Kannata, kannataja:
südänt neist lahti ei saa.


poems translated from Estonian by David McDuff

Marie Under: Au Jardin du Luxembourg

Les murs s'écartent! Il y avait encore de la verdure sur terre!
Comme Moïse l'eau, quelqu'un a fait surgir un jardin du rocher.
Il y a de la terre! Le jardinier a ouvert la bouche de la terre de la vallée de vie
par un long tuyau il conduit l'eau sur le gazon.

Par tout le parc les platanes portent le ciel,
et quelques-uns dans leur cime l'oiseau espiègle du soleil.
Pigeons gris et bruns, gorge jaune renflée:
l'un tend le bec vers le bassin, l'autre frappe une pomme de pin.

Et les taches claires fuient, suivies de leurs ombres,
par l'ouverture de l'allée, sur le gravier humide.
Devant, par-delà une étincelante robe d'eau,
on voit des naïades la hanche qui s'étire.

Autour de la vasque de la fontaine, un million de fleurs
plus de couleurs et de nuances que l'arc-en-ciel
Là les enfants attendent des bateaux, qui dans l'île
sont allés, au milieu du lac plein de rires:

au-dessus vibrent les arcs des rayons d'eau,
Déjà là-haut des feuilles sèches se déchirent
plus bas s'ouvre une fleur tandis que les autres tombent:
c'est le duel vie-mort... automne-printemps.

Et les massifs de fuchsias: les flacons des fleurs
versent encore un brevage bleu et rose.
Là les artistes et leurs modèles
rompent le pain d'un nouvel amour.

Déjà par endroits a pali le drap vert du gazon,
mais le jet d'eau, clair, écume:
blanc de haut en bas comme un cerisier...
Les statues sont seules: la bouche qui chantait est fermée.

Mais les moustaches tombantes de Flaubert parlent d'ascétisme,
Verlaine est amer comme s'il buvait de l'absinthe;
George Sand, si féminine: les plis de pierre de la manche
ne laissent pas deviner l'encre sur ses doigts.

*

Les murs s'écartent et il y a encore de la verdure sur terre!
Comme Moïse l'eau, quelqu'un a fait surgir un jardin du rocher.
Il y a de la terre! Le jardinier a ouvert la bouche de la terre de la vallée de vie
par un long tuyau il conduit l'eau sur le gazon.

translation by courtesy of Leopoldo Niilus


LUXEMBOURGI AIAS

Et hargneb müüristik! Et veel on maa pääl haljust!
Kui Mooses vee, löönd keegi aia kaljust.
On mulda! Aednik avand maa suu: eluorust
vett juhib üle rohtmaa pikast torust.

Plataanid kandmas taevast pargist läbi,
ja mõne ladvas päikse edev lind.
Pruun-hallid tuvid, kummis koldne rind:
kel püüab vesiriba nokk, kel toksib käbi.

Ja helkjaid laike pageb, varjud järgi,
allee avausest üle rõske kruusa.
Ees läbi sätendava vesisärgi
on näha näkineitsi ringutavat puusa.

Fontääni vaagna ümber miljon lilli: värve
ja toone enam neil kui vikerkaarel.
Sääl lapsed laevu ootavad, mis saarel
käind, keset naerust kumisevat järve,

mis üle vesikiirte vibud värisemas, -
Ju ülal juivi lehti kärisemas,
all kargab lahti õis, kui teised pudenevad:
on elu-surma kahevõitlus - sügis-kevad.

Ja fuksiate tarad: õilmepudelid
veel kallutavad sini-roosat jooki. -
Sääl kunstnikud ja nende mudelid
on murdmas uue armu katsekooki.

Ju siin-sääl luitund muru roheline kalev,
on purskkaev aga vahutav ja valev:
see valge üleni kui kirsipuu...
Raidkujud endamisi: kinni laulusuu.

Askeetlusest kuid lausuvad Flaubert'i laskund vurrud,
Verlaine on mõru nagu rüübates absinti;
George Sand nii naiselik: need kivikäikse kurrud
ei lase aimata ta sõrmil tinti.

*

Et hargnes müüristik ja veel on maa pääl haljust!
Kui Mooses vee, löönd keegi aia kaljust.
On muida! Aednik avand maa suu: eluorust
vett juhib üle rohtmaa pikast torust.

Marie Under: Two Poems

Marie Under: Two Poems

Marie Under was born on March 27, 1883, in Tallinn, Estonia, where she spent her childhood. She attended a German-language school. The poetry of Goethe and Schiller was among the earliest things she read. As a member of the "Young Estonia" aesthetic movement in the years before the First World War, she developed a modernistic style, influenced by French literary models, and translated the poetry of Rimbaud, among others. Her first collection was published in 1917, and was followed over the years by many more. She and her husband, the poet Artur Adson, left Estonia before the Soviet occupation of 1944, and settled in Sweden. Marie Under died in 1980.

QUESTION

We saw those berries, overripe and glowing,
in weak and tepid light of the October sun
persisting red as blood, in right full-growing,
without much inkling of the winter clouds to come.

And then a wind-gust brushed those heavy bunches:
and some of them burst, falling to the ground
on wilted grass, soon after, under branches
gold leaves with purple berries lay around.

And hand in hand we walked uphill together
and pushed by the capricious wind's bad weather,
eye to eye, as in anxiety, we asked:

our love's moist, joyful red in present flowering,
will life's breeze carry it away, devouring,
or will it fall to the grave's soil, and last?



CHRISTMAS GREETINGS 1941

I walk the silent, Christmas-snowy path
that goes across the homeland in its suffering.
At each doorstep I would like to bend my knee:
there is no house that doesn't know mourning's sting.

The spark of anger flickers in sorrow's ashes,
the mind is hard with anger, soft with pain:
there is no way of being pure as Christmas
on this white, pure-as-Christmas lane.

Alas, to have to live such stony instants,
to carry on one's heart a coffin lid!
Not even tears will come now any more -
that gift of mercy also died and hid.

I'm like someone rowing backwards:
eyes permanently set on past -
backwards, yes - yet reaching home at last ...
my kinsmen, though, are left without a home...

I always think of those who were torn from here...
The heavens echo with the cries of their distress.
I think that we are all to blame
for what they lack - for we have food and bed!

Shyly, almost as in figurative language,
I ask without believing it can come to pass:
Can we, I wonder, ever use our minds again
for sake of joy and happiness?

Now light and darkness join each other,
towards the stars the parting day ascends.
The sunset holds the first sign of the daybreak -
It is as if, abruptly, night expands.

All things are ardent, serious and sacred,
snow's silver leaf melts on my lashes' flame,
I feel as though I'm rising ever further:
that star there, is it calling me by name?

And then I sense that on this day they also
are raising eyes to stars, from where I hear
a greeting from my kinsfolk, sisters, brothers,
in pain and yearning from their prison's fear.

This is our talk and dialogue, this only,
a shining signal - oh, read, and read! -
with thousand mouths - as if within their glitter
the stars still held some warmth of breath inside.

The field of snow dividing us grows smaller:
of stars our common language is composed....
It is as if we d started out for one another,
were walking, and would soon meet on the road.

For an instant it will die away, that 'When? When?'
forever pulsing in you in your penal plight,
and we shall meet there on that bridge in heaven,
face to face we'll meet, this Christmas night.

translated from Estonian by Leopoldo Niilus and David McDuff