De Vlaamsche Kunstbode. Jaargang 14

[p. 165]

Onze dichters vertaald.

The song of the poppies
(Vrij naar ‘Kollebloemen’, door Pol de Mont).

Among the wheaten

In sweet summertide,

There are the poppies

Dark-red like blood.

Among the corn-stalks,

Tall and high,

There the soft breezes

Whisper their song.

The larks they are fluttering

With joyful, glorious sound,

The mowers are coming,

Along the small path.

And when they hear whisper

The poppies below,

They breathlen are listening

Still for a while.

_**_*

‘Blushing and glorious like carbuncles,

Red, oh! like drops of blood.

We, the purple flowers of summer,

Glow and rejoice in summertide.

Laughing we grow, and waving and swaying,

Soft we whisper our secret song,

But the binders, nor the mowers,

Know what we sing.

Of going and coming, of weary depart,
Of living and dying, and short time on earth,
Of fast-flowing blooddrops as drops of the dew,
Our song tells, our song tells and the breeze sighs: “woe!”
Of poor dying soldiers so cov'red with blood,
Of the darkstained bodies that rest on the soil,
Of despairing tears that the mothers hove shed,
We tell with anguish and mournful a sigh.

[p. 166]

 

Blossoming and blushing we sing our song;

 

Binders nor mowers,

 

They know, what we sing!

 

Whispering do we, come year by year,

 

Ah! our prophecy, our weary prophecy

 

Is for ever but too true’

 

 

 

_**_*

 

 

 

Is 't the wind, that blows the wheaten,

 

Is 't the wind, that so painfully sighs,

 

Is 't the thunder, that somber is rolling,

 

Or are there cannons, that rage for away?

 

 

 

Ah! the mowers do not hear and laughing foil still on,

 

But through the falling corn-ears, how sad the wind is heard.

 

 

 

Ah! weary song of the poppies! -

 

 

 

Grain and wheat they are lost and trampled

 

By the maddened horses,

 

By the maddened horses wild,

 

Hundreds by hundreds in ranks they came riding,

 

Came riding,

 

The guns all were charged, the guns all were charged!

 

The pikes, all the pikes in their hand,

 

Numberless armies they appeared,

 

A thousand cannons following them. -

 

Blood will be gushing,

 

Blood will be streaming,

 

Mothers and sweethearts are sobbing: ‘oh! woe!’

 

Mothers and sweethearts are sobbing: ‘oh! woe!’

 

 

 

Oh! the song of the summerpoppies!

 

 

 

Look, they are there, see them flightning,

 

Hov'ring, swarming they do stride.

 

Hark! there are they; hark! now swearing

 

Cursing, striking, they do kill,

 

As with devilisch rapture mad.

 

 

 

The cannons are raging, thunders rolling,

 

Seeking for blood fly the balls,

 

Glowing circles by bumbs now are traced,

 

And the chief commander here,... is Death!

[p. 167]

 

Oh! the song of the summerpoppies! -

 

 

 

_**_*

 

 

 

Say! is it you, purple flower,

 

Poppy of the summertide;

 

Which-i from for so fair see glisten

 

Near you whitening field of snow?

 

Or the binders, or the mowers?

 

Or the horses with their men,

 

Who near you in sleep are laying,

 

While the sad gloomy sun of winter,

 

Melancholy, pale and dreary,

 

Mournful on their slumber laughs? -

 

 

 

Alas! the poppies are dead since long,

 

Alas! the mowers, they slumber no more:

 

They went for their tirants to cruel war,

 

They have done their duty until the end,

 

They went and then were slain, then were slain... -

 

O wondrous song of purple, purple summerpoppies!

 

 

 

Alas! what colours yonder snow,

 

So red, no poppies are doing so,

 

But members and bodies cut through and forlorn...

 

't Is blood!

 

't Is blood!

 

Oh! weary song of purple, purple summerpoppies!

 

 

 

_**_*

 

 

 

Blooming and blushing they song, the poppies,

 

Their prophetic song,

 

Binders and mowers came to pass them...

 

Ah! but dit not catch their sense.

 

Blooming, blushing they come and sing it,

 

Evry summer, year by year. -

 

Ah! their threatening prophecy,

 

Is for ever but too true,

 

But too true,

 

But too true!

 

 

 

L.S..

London, 1880.⁽¹⁾

(1) Gecomponeerd door Edgar Tinel en voor de eerste maal uitgevoerd te Leuven, in 1879.

[p. 168]

Paralipomena.
(Uit ‘Lentesotternijen’ van Pol de Mont).

Alte Brunnen, lang versiegt,
wieder sollt ihr fliessen!
Nachtigall, im Grün gewiegt,
neuen Sang ergiessen!
Dürrer Zweig an altem Ast,
neue Knospen sollst du treiben...
Herz, beschwert von Kummers Last,
neuen Lebenskreis beschreiben!

_* * _*

Klang, beseelt van deutscher Gluth,
Minnelust von Mädchen, Knaben,
Volkslied, stolz wie Meeres Fluth,
freien Einzug sollt ihr haben;
werdet Alten neues Blut,
Jungen mächtige Sehnsucht geben.
Alt und Jung, in Dichters Hut,
sollt in frohen Liedern leben!

H. FLEMMICH.

Freiburg (Baden).