The Dead og Donal Og

Skrapp aðeins í bíó í gær, smá frí frá lestrinum, og fór á The Dead sem var svanasöngurinn hans John Huston. Mjög nauðsynlegt að sjá svona myndir með reglulegu millibili. Vel leikin, eðlileg, einföld og falleg. Anjelica Huston þarf ekki nema að mæta, einstök. Allaveganna, vil ekki lengja mál mitt of mikið. Er að drukna í Londonundirbúningi, á þessum tíma á morgun verð ég mætt á svæðið. Frábærar fréttir líka: Það verður mini-reunion hjá Li Po Chun nemum á hádegi á morgun, er að fara hitta fólk sem ég hef ekki séð í nærri þrjú ár, ótrúlegt hvað tíminn líður. Anyhow, þetta var ekki tilgangurinn með þessu bloggi. Tilgangurinn var sá að í The Dead var upplestur af ótrúlegu ljóði, er enn að sætta mig við það hversu fullkomið það er. Set það á sama stall og W.H. Auden Funeral Blues. Þetta ljóð heitir Donal Og (eða Young Donal):

Donal Og

It is late last night the dog was speaking of you;
the snipe was speaking of you in her deep marsh.
It is you are the lonely bird through the woods;
and that you may be without a mate until you find me.

You promised me, and you said a lie to me,
that you would be before me where the sheep are flocked;
I gave a whistle and three hundred cries to you,
and I found nothing there but a bleating lamb.

You promised me a thing that was hard for you,
a ship of gold under a silver mast;
twelve towns with a market in all of them,
and a fine white court by the side of the sea.

You promised me a thing that is not possible,
that you would give me gloves of the skin of a fish;
that you would give me shoes of the skin of a bird;
and a suit of the dearest silk in Ireland.

When I go by myself to the Well of Loneliness,
I sit down and I go through my trouble;
when I see the world and do not see my boy,
he that has an amber shade in his hair.

It was on that Sunday I gave my love to you;
the Sunday that is last before Easter Sunday.
And myself on my knees reading the Passion;
and my two eyes giving love to you for ever.

My mother said to me not to be talking with you today,
or tomorrow, or on the Sunday;
it was a bad time she took for telling me that;
it was shutting the door after the house was robbed.

My heart is as black as the blackness of the sloe,
or as the black coal that is on the smith's forge;
or as the sole of a shoe left in the white halls;
it was you that put that darkness over my life.

You have taken the east from me, you have taken the west from me;
you have taken what is before me and what is behind me;
you have taken the moon, you have taken the sun from me;
and my fear is great that you have taken God from me!

- Anonymous, 8th Century Ireland, translated by Lady Augusta Gregory.