13.12.08

ΠΡΕΠΕΙ ΝΑ ΑΓΑΠΟΥΜΕ Ο ΕΝΑΣ ΤΟΝ ΑΛΛΟ ΑΛΛΙΩΣ ΘΑ ΠΕΘΑΝΟΥΜΕ

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Isherwood - Auden

1 Σεπτεμβρίου 1939

(...)
Όλο κι όλο που έχω είναι μια φωνή
Για να ανατρέψω το γερά σφηνωμένο ψέμα
Το ρομαντικό ψέμα μέσα στο μυαλό
Του τρυφηλού καθημερινού ανθρώπου
Και το ψέμα της Εξουσίας
Που τα κτίριά της ψαύουν τον ουρανό:
Αυτό που αποκαλούμε Κράτος δεν υφίσταται
Ούτε μπορεί κανείς να υπάρξει μοναχός του’
Η πείνα δεν αφήνει περιθώρια επιλογών
Ούτε στους πολίτες ούτε στην αστυνομία’
Πρέπει να αγαπούμε ο ένας τον άλλο αλλιώς θα πεθάνουμε.

Ανίσχυρος μέσα στη νυχτιά
Ο κόσμος κείτεται ναρκωμένος’
Κι ακόμη, διάσπαρτα παντού
Σαρκαστικά στίγματα φωτός
Ακτινοβολούν οπουδήποτε οι Κριτές
Ανταλλάσσουν τις θελήσεις τους:
Ίσως κι εγώ, πλασμένος όπως κι αυτά
Από Έρωτα και κονιορτό,
Πολιορκημένος από την ίδια
Διάψευση κι απελπισία,
Να εκπέμπω μια λάμψη κατάφασης.

Γ. Χ. Ώντεν
«Νέας Υόρκης το ανάγνωσμα» (ανθολογία αμερικανικών ποιημάτων), εκδ. Παρατηρητής, 2002
Μετάφραση: Σάκης Σερέφας
στις

2 σχόλια:

  1. Tales from the other side of town10 Δεκεμβρίου, 2008 17:38

    χμ...εξαιρετικό κομμάτι...
    ...έπιασες κέντρο :-)

    ΑπάντησηΔιαγραφή
  2. erva_cidreira10 Δεκεμβρίου, 2008 19:05

    SEPTEMBER 1, 1939
    by W.H. Auden


    I sit in one of the dives
    On Fifty-second Street
    Uncertain and afraid
    As the clever hopes expire
    Of a low dishonest decade:
    Waves of anger and fear
    Circulate over the bright
    And darkened lands of the earth,
    Obsessing our private lives;
    The unmentionable odour of death
    Offends the September night.

    Accurate scholarship can
    Unearth the whole offence
    From Luther until now
    That has driven a culture mad,
    Find what occurred at Linz,
    What huge imago made
    A psychopathic god:
    I and the public know
    What all schoolchildren learn,
    Those to whom evil is done
    Do evil in return.

    Exiled Thucydides knew
    All that a speech can say
    About Democracy,
    And what dictators do,
    The elderly rubbish they talk
    To an apathetic grave;
    Analysed all in his book,
    The enlightenment driven away,
    The habit-forming pain,
    Mismanagement and grief:
    We must suffer them all again.

    Into this neutral air
    Where blind skyscrapers use
    Their full height to proclaim
    The strength of Collective Man,
    Each language pours its vain
    Competitive excuse:
    But who can live for long
    In an euphoric dream;
    Out of the mirror they stare,
    Imperialism's face
    And the international wrong.

    Faces along the bar
    Cling to their average day:
    The lights must never go out,
    The music must always play,
    All the conventions conspire
    To make this fort assume
    The furniture of home;
    Lest we should see where we are,
    Lost in a haunted wood,
    Children afraid of the night
    Who have never been happy or good.

    The windiest militant trash
    Important Persons shout
    Is not so crude as our wish:
    What mad Nijinsky wrote
    About Diaghilev
    Is true of the normal heart;
    For the error bred in the bone
    Of each woman and each man
    Craves what it cannot have,
    Not universal love
    But to be loved alone.

    From the conservative dark
    Into the ethical life
    The dense commuters come,
    Repeating their morning vow;
    'I will be true to the wife,
    I'll concentrate more on my work,'
    And helpless governors wake
    To resume their compulsory game:
    Who can release them now,
    Who can reach the dead,
    Who can speak for the dumb?

    All I have is a voice
    To undo the folded lie,
    The romantic lie in the brain
    Of the sensual man-in-the-street
    And the lie of Authority
    Whose buildings grope the sky:
    There is no such thing as the State
    And no one exists alone;
    Hunger allows no choice
    To the citizen or the police;
    We must love one another or die.

    Defenseless under the night
    Our world in stupor lies;
    Yet, dotted everywhere,
    Ironic points of light
    Flash out wherever the Just
    Exchange their messages:
    May I, composed like them
    Of Eros and of dust,
    Beleaguered by the same
    Negation and despair,
    Show an affirming flame.

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