Adam Mickiewicz Collected Poetical Works

by Adam Mickiewicz

  To shed the blood of all and to destroy,

  And all shall curse him, one heart yet alone

  Shall dare afar to bless him.” Here I chose

  My habitation and my grave apart,

  In silence, where the sacrilege of groans

  The traveller dare not listen. Thou, I know,

  Lovest to walk alone. Within myself

  I thought, “Maybe at even he will come,

  Having his comrades left behind, to hold

  Converse with winds and billows of the lake;

  And he will think of me and hear my voice.”

  And Heaven did fulfil my innocent wish.

  Thou earnest; thou didst understand my song.

  I prayed in former times that dreams might bless

  Me with thine image, though the form were mute:

  To-day, what happiness! To-day, together, —

  Together we may weep!

  Konrad.

  And wherefore weep?

  I wept, thou dost remember, when I tore

  Myself for ever from thy dear embrace,

  And of my free will died from happiness,

  That thus I might designs of blood fulfil.

  That too long martyrdom at length is crowned.

  Now stand I at the summit of desires;

  I can revenge me on the enemy.

  And thou hast come to tear my victory from me!

  Till now, when from the window of thy turret

  Thou didst look on me, in the world’s whole circle

  Again there seemed no thing to meet my eye,

  But the lake only, and the tower and grate.

  Around me all with tumult seethes of war.

  ‘Mid trumpet clamour, ‘mid the clash of arms,

  I seek impatient with a straining ear,

  For the angelic sound of thy sweet lips,

  And all the day for me is waiting hope.

  And when the evening season I have reached,

  I wish to lengthen it by memories:

  I reckon by its evenings all my life.

  Meanwhile the Order murmurs at repose,

  Entreat for war, demand their own perdition;

  And vengeful Halban will not let me breathe,

  But still recalls to me those ancient vows,

  The slaughtered hamlets, and the lands destroyed;

  Or if I will not listen his reproaches,

  He with one sigh, one glance, one beckoning,

  Can blow my smouldering vengeance to a flame.

  Now seems my destiny to near its end;

  Nought the Crusaders can withhold from war.

  A messenger from Rome came yesterday.

  From the world’s every quarter, clouds unnumbered

  A pious zeal hath gathered in the field,

  And all call out to me to lead them on

  With sword and cross upon the walls of Wilna.

  And yet — with shame I must confess — ev’n now,

  While destinies of mighty nations pend,

  I think of thee, and still invent delays,

  That we may pass together one more day.

  O youth! how fearful was thy sacrifice!

  When young, love, happiness, a very heaven,

  I for a nation’s cause could sacrifice

  With grief, but courage; — and to-day, grown old, —

  To-day despair, my duty, and God’s will

  Compel me to the field, and still I dare not

  Tear my grey head from these walls’ pedestal,

  That I may not forego thy sweet conversing.

  He ceased. Groans only issued from the tower.

  Long hours flowed by in silence. Now the night

  Reddened, and now the water’s stilly face

  Blushed with the ray of dawn. Among the leaves

  Of sleeping bushes with a rustling murmur

  The morning freshness flew. The birds awoke

  With their soft notes, then once again they ceased,

  And by long-during silence gave to know

  They had too early woken. Konrad rose,

  Lifted his eyes unto the tower, and looked

  With anguish on the grate. The nightingale

  Awoke in song, then Konrad looked around.

  ’Tis morning! and he let his visor down,

  And in his cloak’s wide folds concealed his face.

  With beckoning of his hand he signs adieu,

  And in the bushes how is lost

  Ev’n thus,

  A spirit infernal from a hermit’s door

  Doth vanish at the sound of matin bell.

  The Festival.

  It was the Patron’s day, a solemn feast;

  Komturs and brethren to the city ride;

  White banners wave upon the castle towers:

  Konrad invites the knights to festival.

  A hundred white cloaks wave around the board,

  On every mantle is the long black cross, — These

  are the brethren, and behind them stand

  The young esquires to serve them, in a ring.

  Konrad sat at the top; upon his left

  The place was Witold’s, with his leaders brave, —

  One time their foe, to-day the Order’s guest,

  Leagued against Litwa as their firm ally.

  The Master, rising, gives the festal word,

  “Rejoice we in the Lord!” The goblets gleamed.

  “Rejoice we in the Lord!” cried thousand voices.

  The silver shone, the wine poured forth in streams.

  Silent sat Wallenrod, upon his elbow

  Leaning, and heard with scorn the unseemly noise.

  The uproar ceased; scarcely low-spoken jests

  Alternate here and there the cup’s light clash.

  “Let us rejoice,” he says. “How now, my brethren!

  Beseems it valiant knights to thus rejoice?

  One time a drunken clamour, now low murmurs?

  Must we then feast like bandits or like monks?

  “There were far other customs in my time,

  When on the battlefield with corpses piled,

  On Castile’s mountains or in Finland’s woods,

  We drank beside the camp-fire.

  “Those were songs!

  Is there no bard, no minstrel in the crowd?

  Wine maketh glad indeed the heart of man,

  But song it is that forms the spirit’s wine.”

  Then various singers all at once arose;

  A fat Italian here, with birdlike tones,

  Sings Konrad’s valour and great piety;

  And there a troubadour from the Garonne,

  The stories of enamoured shepherds sings,

  Of maids enchanted and of wandering knights.

  Wallenrod slept; — meanwhile the songs are o’er.

  Awakened sudden by the loss of sound,

  He to the Italian cast a purse of gold.

  “To me alone,” he said, “thou didst sing praise.

  Another may not give thee recompense;

  Take and depart. Let that young troubadour,

  Who serveth youth and beauty, pardon us

  That in the knightly throng we have no damsel,

  To fasten a vain rosebud to his breast

  The roses here are faded. I would have

  Another bard, — the cloister knight desires

  Another song; but be it wild and harsh,

  Like to the voice of horns, the clash of swords.

  And be it gloomy as the cloister walls,

  And fiery as a solitary drunkard.

  “Of us, who sanctify and murder men,

  Let song of murderous tone proclaim the saintship,

  And melt our heart, and rouse to rage, — and weary;

  And let it then again affright the weary.

  Such is our life, and such our song should be;

  Who then will sing it?”

  “I,” replied an old

  And venerable man, who near th
e door

  Sat ‘mid the squires and pages, by his robe

  Prussian or Litwin. Thick his beard, by age

  Whitened; the last grey hairs wave on his head;

  His brow and eyes are covered by a veil;

  Sufferings and years are graven on his face.

  He bore in his right hand a Prussian lute,

  But towards the table stretched his left hand forth,

  And by this sign entreated audience.

  All then were silent.

  “I will sing,” he cried.

  “Once sang I to the Prussians and to Litwa;

  Some now have perished in their land’s defence;

  Others will not outlive their country’s loss,

  But rather slay themselves upon her corse;

  As servants true, in good and evil lot,

  Will perish on their benefactor’s pile.

  Others more shamefully in forests hide;

  Others, like Witold, dwell among you here.

  “But after death? — Germans! ye know full well.

  Ask of the wicked traitors to their land

  What, they shall do when, in that further world,

  Condemned to burning of eternal fires,

  They would their ancestors invoke from paradise?

  What language shall entreat them for their aid?

  If in their German, their barbaric speech,

  The forefathers will know their children’s voice.

  “O children! what a foul disgrace for Litwa,

  That none of you, aye, none, defended me,

  When from the shrine, the hoary Wajdelote,

  Away they dragged me into German chains!

  Alone in foreign lands have I grown old.

  A singer! — alas! to no one can I sing!

  On Litwa looking, I wept out mine eyes.

  To-day, if I would sigh towards my home,

  I know not where that home beloved lies,

  If here, or there, or in another place.

  “Here only, in my heart, have I preserved

  That in my Fatherland my best possession;

  And these poor remnants of my former treasure

  You Germans take from me, — take memory from me!

  “As a defeated knight in tournament

  Escapes with life though honour has been lost;

  And, dragging out despisèd days in scorn,

  Returns once more unto his conqueror;

  And for the last time straining forth his arm,

  Breaketh his sword beneath the victor’s feet, —

  So my last failing courage me inspires;

  Yet once more to the lute my hand is bold;

  Let the last Wajdelote of Litwa sing

  Litwa’s last song!”

  He ended, and awaited

  The Master’s answer. All in silence deep

  Await. With mockery and with curious eye

  Konrad tracks Witold’s every look and motion.

  They noted all how when the Wajdelote

  Of traitors spoke, a change o’er Witold came.

  Livid he grew and pale again he blushed,

  Alike tormented by his rage and shame.

  At last, his sabre casting from his side,

  He goes, dividing all the astonished crowd.

  He looked upon the old man, stayed his steps;

  The clouds of anger hanging o’er his brow

  Fell sudden in a rapid flood of tears;

  He turned, sat down, with cloak he veiled his face,

  And into secret meditation plunged

  The Germans whispered, “Shall we to our feasts

  Admit old beggars? Who will hear the song,

  And who will understand?” Such voices were

  Among the crowd of revellers, and broken

  By constant peals of ever-growing laughter.

  The pages cry, whistling on nuts, “Behold!

  This is the tune of the Litvanian song.”

  Upon that Konrad rose. “Ye valiant knights!

  To-day the Order, by a solemn custom,

  Receiveth gifts from princes and from towns,

  As homage from a conquered country due.

  The beggar brings a song as offering

  To you: forbid we not the old man’s homage.

  Take we the song; ‘twill be the widow’s mite.

  “Among us we behold the Litwin prince;

  His captains are the Order’s guests: to him

  Sweet will it be to list the memory

  Of ancient deeds, recalled in native speech.

  Who understands not, let him go from hence.

  I love betimes to hear the gloomy groans

  Of those Litvanian songs, not understood,

  Even as I love the noise of warring waves,

  Or the soft murmur of the rain in spring; —

  Sweetly they charm to sleep. Sing, ancient bard!”

  Song of the Wajdelote.

  When over Litwa cometh plague and death,

  The bard’s prophetic eye beholds, afraid.

  If to the Wajdelote’s word be given faith,

  On desert plains and churchyards, sayeth fame,

  Stands visibly the pestilential maid,

  In white, upon her brow a wreath of flame, —

  Her brow the trees of Bialowiez outbraves, —

  And in her hand a blood-stained cloth she waves.

  The castle guards in terror veil their eyes,

  The peasants’ dogs, deep burrowing in the ground,

  Scent death approaching, howl with fearful cries

  The maid’s ill-boding step, o’er all is found;

  O’er hamlets, castles, and rich towns she goes.

  Oft as she waves the bloody cloth, no less

  A palace changes to a wilderness;

  Where treads her foot a recent grave up-grows.

  O woeful sight! But yet a heavier doom

  Foretold to Litwa from the German side, —

  The shining helmet with the ostrich plume,

  And the wide mantle with the black cross dyed.

  For where that spectre’s fearful step has passed,

  Nought is a hamlet’s ruin or a town,

  But a whole country to the grave is cast

  O thou to whom is Litwa’s spirit dear!

  Come, on the graves of nations sit we down;

  We’ll meditate, and sing, and shed the tear.

  O native song! between the elder day,

  Ark of the Covenant, and younger times,

  Wherein their heroes’ swords the people lay,

  Their flowers of thought and web of native rhymes.

  Thou ark! no stroke can break thee or subdue,

  While thine own people hold thee not debased.

  O native song! thou art as guardian placed,

  Defending memories of a nation’s word.

  The Archangel’s wings are thine, his voice thine too,

  And often wieldest thou Archangel’s sword.

  The flame devoureth story’s pictured words,

  And thieves with steel wide scatter treasure hoards.

  But scatheless is the song the poet sings.

  And should vile spirits still refuse to give

  Sorrow and hope, whereby the song may live,

  Upward she flieth and to ruins clings,

  And thence relateth ancient histories.

  The nightingale from burning dwellings flits,

  But on the roof, a moment yet she sits;

  When falls the roof she to the forest flies,

  And from her laden breast o’er dying embers,

  Sings a low dirge the passer-by remembers.

  I heard the song! An ancient peasant swain,

  When over bones his iron ploughshare rang,

  Stood, and on flute of willow played a strain,

  Prayers for the dead, or, with a rhymed lament,

  Of you, great childless fathers, then he sang.

  The echoes answered. I from far did hear,<
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  And sorrow brought the sight and song more near;

  In eyes and ears my spirit all was bent.

  As on the judgment-day the dead past all

  The Archangel’s trumpet from the tomb shall call,

  So from the song the dead bones upward grew

  To giant forms, from sleep of death awake,

  Pillars and arches from their ruin anew,

  And countless oars splashed in the desert lake;

  And soon the castle-gates wide open seemed,

  And princes’ crowns and warriors’ armour gleamed.

  Now sing the bards, the dance the maidens weave;

  I dreamed of marvels, — and awoke to grieve.

  Forests and native hills are vanished,

  And thought doth fail, on weary pinions fled,

  And sinketh in a hidden stillness drear.

  The lute is silent in my stiffened hand,

  And ‘mid the groan of comrades of my land,

  The voices of the past I may not hear.

  Still something of that youthful fire once mine

  Smoulders within me, and at times its light

  Wakens the soul and maketh memory bright.

  Then memory, like a lamp of crystalline,

  The pencil has with painted colours decked,

  Although by dust bedimmed, with scars beflecked;

  Place but within its heart a little light,

  With freshness of its colours eyes are lured,

  On palace walls yet gleaming fair and bright,

  Lovely, though yet with dusty cloud obscured.

  O could I but this fire of mine impart

  To all my hearers’ breasts, the shapes upraise

  Of those dead times, and reach the very heart

  Of all my brothers with my burning lays!

  But haply even in this passing hour,

  Now when their native song their hearts can move,

  The pulses of those hearts may beat more strong,

  Their souls may feel the ancient pride and love;

  And live one moment in such noble power,

  As lived their forefathers their whole life long.

  But why invoke the ages long gone by,

  And for the present’s glory find no voice?

  For in your midst a great man liveth nigh —

  I sing of him. Ye, Litwini, rejoice!

  Silent the old man was, and hearkened round,

  If still the Germans will permit his song.

  Around the hall there reigned a silence deep;

  This warms all poets to a newer zeal.

  Once more he raised his song, but other theme;

  O’er freer cadences his voice did range.

  More rarely he, and lighter, touched the strings,

  Descending from the hymn to simple story.

  The Wajdelote’s Tale.

  Whence come the Litwins? From a nightly sally;

  From church and castle they have won rich spoils,