Резултати претраге

Grey-eyed King

Glory to you, endless, boundless pain!
The grey-eyed king suddenly died yesterday.
Fall’s crimson evening was stuffy and staid,
When he came home, my spouse quite calmly said:
 
“From hunting trip he was carried back home,
They found his dead body under the oak.
Pity the Queen. He was so young and strong!..
Just overnight she turned grey, it’s so wrong.”
 
His smoking pipe on the mantel he found
And went to his night shift by usual route.
I will wake my daughter up from her sleep
And gaze into her eyes, so grey, lovely, deep.
 
Poplars are whispering
Into the wind:
“Perished your love, your young grey-eyed king...”
 

Radiance

You travel the roads
On the edge, where the sky is strict,
There, where the sky is not strict,
Maybe even waiting a long while for us there.
 
In a hurry to say goodbye
And in the distance the birds,
And in the distance the birds,
Will all sing together at once with us. 1
 
Maybe that it is you’re not you,
Or just maybe it is that I’m not myself 2
Here we go, like a drunk
Along empty roads.
 
But it isn’t strange, not at all 3
Suddenly we see the radiance,
Suddenly we see the radiance
Unearthly pure.
 
Yes, the radiance…
Yes, the radiance…4
 
So yourself should be with God
Passing the streets of the poor,
Passing the streets of the poor,
Without regret.
 
Come around during the dark of the evening,
So wander like a vagrant,
Yes you homeless wanderer
(Who will) suddenly give a shoulder. 5
 
Maybe that it is you’re not you,
Or just maybe it is that I’m not myself 2
Here we go, like a drunk
Along empty roads.
 
But it isn’t strange, not at all 3
Suddenly we see the radiance,
Suddenly we see the radiance
Unearthly pure.
 
Yes, radiance…
Yes, radiance…
Yes, radiance…
Yes, radiance...
 
Along the forbidden edge,
Where the sorrows of the unknown rest, 6
Where the sorrows of the unknown rest,
Maybe even waiting a long while for us there.
 
Will the sun glisten 7
And the distant birds,
Yes the distant birds,
Will all sing together at once with us.
 

• 1. Strange line, hard to interpret to be honest but I think that is right. I omitted “with” because it just sounds bizarre having it in there, and interpreted “with” as “with us” in the final line of this stanza.
• Yeah I know this was a bit of interpolation and slightly altering these two, but they would’ve sounded weird without it.
• Felt like it sounded better not repeating “It felt strange, it felt strange”
• 4. On face value I don’t think it is a stretch to say Piknik is a psychedelic fantasy slav-cult judging by their lyrics.
• 5. By this I think he is saying “Who will suddenly help” or “Lend a hand”.
• 6. “Rest” sounded more poetic than “are”
• 7. Or maybe my brain is tuned to “poetic and slightly more profound albeit longer and more complicated idioms” mode.

To me, music is a form of speech, and just like speech, music should be heard to all regardless of barriers in place. So by translating you're letting other people open up to a world that is alien to them, a world where many who listen to the Russian, German and French music I listen to, is not strange or weird because they do not understand what the singer is singing. By having translations music can share cultural and political ideas, or really just ideas, around without barrier, and allow for discussion over meaning and purpose instead of trivial pursuit.