Slovenian Literator

Zajc Dane:
Bells Of A New Day

Wind. And rocks.

And cold.

Cold in the red sky.

Cold in the bluish peaks.

In the frozen moss.

Cold in the scarlet blossoms.

Cold in the abyss,

where the fog swirls round

into a ball of rancor,

into a ball of nausea,

into a ball of hysterical laughter.

The morning is heralded by

the soft bells of the herd

upon the ridge.

From the dark waters

emerge the rocky shoulders of the mountains.

Grim and immobile.

The wind rips by them

an invisible sail boat.

The morning is heralded by clouds

which wash their threatening

greedy hands

in the bloody lake of first dawn.

The sky is blanketed in the dance of bears.

It is blanketed by a dark threat.

Cold settles on the earth.

The first light lies

dismembered among the rocks.

The fog simmers in the cauldron of the abyss.

You are alone in this world.

Like a rock is alone,

sighs the wind

past the mountain’s craggy face.

And with this solace, the broken bells

of a herd of sheep

ring in the new day.

Translated by Erica Johnson Debeljak

Archived by Thezaurus on 09/04/01 | permalink |

Dane Zajc

(1929-2005) A poet, essayist, and playwright who, until his retirement, worked as a librarian in Ljubljana. Considered the doyen of postwar poets, he was active in the foundation of numerous literary magazines, including Review 57 (Revija 57), Problems (Problemi) and Perspectives (Perspektive), which he also edited. His lyrical poems displayed dark and depressing atmospheres, and were suffused with stark existentialist images which helped undermine the then-obligatory aesthetics of socialist realism. In the 1960s, with the advent of neoavant-garde writing, Zajc's poems won renewed appreciation and became part of the national canon. Zajc also writes for children (poems, prose and plays). He is best known, however, for his poetic plays, such as Children of the River (Otroka reke). A former Fulbright fellow at Columbia University in New York , he has seen the publication of his collected works in five volumes in 1990. Zajc received the Prešeren Prize for lifetime achievement in 1981.