Andry-Andreja Jakuš’s Post
“We shall remember once, too late,
This simple happening, so fine,
This very bench where we are seated
Your burning temple next to mine.”
Tudor Arghezi
BETWEEN TWO NIGHTS
I stuck my sharp spade into the room.
Outside the wind blew,
Rain fell.
And I dug below earth into my room.
Outside the rain fell,
Wind blew.
I heaved soil through the window
Out of the hole.
The earth was black,
Its curtain blue.
Soil piled high
Against panes.
The peak was world-wide;
At the top Jesus wept.
The spade broke.
He who broke it stands there
With stone relics:
The Father himself.
I returned through time
By the way I descended.
In the empty room
Anxiety again.
I wanted to climb to the peak.
In the heavens a star shone.
In the sky it was late.
***
PERHAPS IT’S TIME
Perhaps it’s time, since there falls
From trees all leafage that has been
And shone,
To look our past calmly in the face
When its track of shade starts to pain.
Without humility and pride,
Let us recall ourselves in the night
From thread to thread,
And witness on rocks the zigzags of chalk
In which fragile testimony left its trace.
One day, trifling, small, one night blazing
With astral light,
Sometimes crucified, sometimes free and great,
Often small,
Shepherds of chrysanthemums, prophets
For ants.
Above us eagles float blue in the sky.
And if our knees are torn by thorny paths,
Why does everything that has ever been
Turn to sadness?
Is it not autumn? Let us make a shelter
Of ourselves,
And gather the desert near the warmth
Of homes.
Let’s take spent ashes from ancient altars,
Kindle them anew, give them
More fruitful smoke.
Let us scatter the seed on future plains
Hoping sadly for the late harvest.
***
SONG
I defended myself in vain; now I’m slinking away
In the white moon’s shade, tall spear shattered.
I had put dikes of earth and water between us,
And everywhere we were beside each other.
I meet you waiting at the tracks’ every turn,
Silent perpetual companion.
At the wells you wet your palms with water and give me some,
Water that sprang up soundless among stones.
You’ve undone your blouse and ask, breast in hand,
If I wish to quench my thirst there, or at the well.
Your silence is heard in every sound,
In thunderstorms, prayer, steps, violins.
What I suffer seems to pain you,
Whether birth or desolation.
Close beside me, yet distant…
***
Bios
Tudor Arghezi (21 May 1880 – 14 July 1967) was a Romanian writer, best known for his unique contribution to poetry and children’s literature.
Born Ion N. Theodorescu in Bucharest, he explained that his pen name was related to Argesis, the Latin name for the Arges River.
Arghezi is perhaps the most striking figure of Romanian interwar literature.
The freshness of his vocabulary represents a most original synthesis between the traditional styles and modernism.
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Andry-Andreja Jakus, a Professor at Hacettepe University, Zagreb, Croatia, is Academic Writer, Bibliographer, Lexicographer, Translator, Language Tutor and Reviewer. In her columns, she writes on poetry, philosophy, cultural studies, history of religions etc.
Courtesy: Andry-Andreja Jakus/LinkedIn – Published with permission of the author
