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Seifert, Jaroslav: Věnec sonetů IX

Portre of Seifert, Jaroslav

Věnec sonetů IX (Czech)

Kdyby smrt volal opět sýček
a my zas schody do chrámu
hledali ve tmě k neznámu
jen s plamenem svých olejniček ?

Až budem žalovati nebi
a až nám budou nejblíže
studený kámen u mříže
a nohu probodené hřeby,

ať Ta, jež dneska okolo má
mladistvý půvab dívčích čel
a je tu u nás v květnu doma,

přemluví Toho, jenž se hněvá.
Nebyli bychom víc než pleva,
kdyby Bůh na nás zanevřel.



Uploaded byRépás Norbert
PublisherViněta Miloslav Troup, sazba a tisk Jaroslav Picka (samizdatové vydání)
Source of the quotationPraha a věnec sonetů. Básně z let 1945 - 1949. Sbírka Monumenta genii bohemici, sv. 4.
Publication date

A Wreath of Sonnets IX (English)

If the old owl our Death were calling
and we were looking for the stairs
to church, in darkness, with the flares
of feeble oil lamps, feeling, crawling.

And then, when thus compelled, now humble,
to cry to silent heavens, here
much nearer to cold stone and bier
and His nailed feet, oh how we'd mumble:

may She who smiles on maidens' graces
and shades them with her mighty wing,
when here in May lights up their faces,

persuade the One we irritated.
We'd be like chaff, annihilated,
if God His wrath on us did bring.



Uploaded byRépás Norbert
PublisherToronto : Larkwood Books Sixty-Eight (first published March 1952), ISBN: 0-88781-189-2
Source of the quotationA Wreath of Sonnets: Věnec sonetů

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