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Heaney, Seamus: The First Kingdom

Portre of Heaney, Seamus

The First Kingdom (English)

The royal roads were cow paths.

The queen mother hunkered on a stool

and played the harpstrings of milk

into a wooden pail.

With seasoned sticks the nobles

lorded it over the hindquarters of cattle.

 

Units of measurement were pondered

by the cartful, barrowful and bucketful.

Time was a backward rote of names and mishaps,

bad harvests, fires, unfair settlements,

deaths in floods, murders and miscarriages.

 

And if my right to it all came only

by their acclamation, what was it worth?

I blew hot and blew cold.

They were two-faced and accommodating.

And seed, breed and generation still

they are holding on, every bit

as pious and exacting and demeaned.



Uploaded byP. T.
Source of the quotationhttp://inwardboundpoetry.blogspot.com/2007/02/336-first-kingdom-seamus-heaney.html

Az első királyság (Hungarian)

A királyi utak csapások voltak.

Az anyakirálynő sámlin kuporgott

és a tőgyek hárfahúrjain

játszotta a tejet a fadézsába.

Száraz vesszővel uralkodtak

a nemesek a tehenek farán.

 

A legfontosabb mértékegységek

a szekér, a taliga, és a vödör.

Az időt nevek és bajok sora méri,

hátrafelé: aszály, háztűz, pereskedés,

árvizek és gyilkosságok áldozatai.

 

Ha jogom mindehhez csak azért van,

mert kikiáltottak, hát mennyit ér?

Fújtam forrót, fújtam hideget.

Ők kétarcúak voltak és készségesek.

Magot szórtak, sokasodtak, szaporodtak,

és generációk óta minden ízükben

ájtatosak, szigorúak és megtaposottak.



Uploaded byP. T.
Source of the quotationhttp://irc.sunchat.hu/vers/

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