Poem
George Szirtes
My Father Carries Me Across a Field
MIJN VADER DRAAGT ME OVER EEN TERREIN
Mijn vader draagt me over een terrein,’t Is nacht, de greppels zijn met sneeuw beklad.
Dik slik. We moeten zien dat we onzichtbaar zijn
Voor iets gevaarlijks maar ik weet niet wat.
Dan loop ook ik en raakt allengs ons stel
Steeds verder uit elkaar. Volgt elk zijn pad.
Heb ik dit maar gedroomd, dit schimmenspel,
Het honderdbunderbos waar uil knipoogde
En ezel sprak? En waar ik knus en wel
In bed lig, maar wij hand in hand bewogen
Door dit landschap? Mijn vader steeds
Voor mij, net een vreemd, haast vervlogen
Wezen en ik daar achter hem vol vrees
Over het veld richting mijn ondergang.
Overal op dit land zweven de geesten.
De winterkou die ons bevangt
Bevangt ook hen. Mijn vader kijkt in ’t rond,
Glimlacht en draait zich om. Wij zijn zonder belang
Op deze plek maar gaan maar voort, de mond
Stijf dicht, verlorenen die slechts een leeg
Vel achterlaten en donker bevroren grond
Passeren of ze over een toneel bewegen.
© Vertaling: 2009, Rob Schouten
My Father Carries Me Across a Field
My father carries me across a field.It’s night and there are trenches filled with snow.
Thick mud. We’re careful to remain concealed
From something frightening I don’t yet know.
And then I walk and there is space between
The four of us. We go where we have to go.
Did I dream it all, this ghostly scene,
The hundred-acre wood where the owl blinked
And the ass spoke? Where I am cosy and clean
In bed, but we are floating, our arms linked
Over the landscape? My father moves ahead
Of me, like some strange, almost extinct
Species, and I follow him in dread
Across the field towards my own extinction.
Spirits everywhere are drifting over blasted
Terrain. The winter cold makes no distinction
Between them and us. My father looks round
And smiles then turns away. We have no function
In this place but keep moving, without sound,
Lost figures who leave only a blank page
Behind them, and the dark and frozen ground
They pass across as they might cross a stage.
© 2004, George Szirtes
From: Reel
Publisher: Bloodaxe, Tarset
From: Reel
Publisher: Bloodaxe, Tarset
George Szirtes
(Hungary, 1948)
George Szirtes was born in Hungary in 1948, but fled during the Hungarian Uprising of 1956 to England, where he studied at the art academies of London and Leeds before establishing himself as a painter. In addition, he wrote poetry. His first collection The Slant Door, written in his adopted mother tongue, appeared in 1979.
Poems
Poems of George Szirtes
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My Father Carries Me Across a Field
My father carries me across a field.It’s night and there are trenches filled with snow.
Thick mud. We’re careful to remain concealed
From something frightening I don’t yet know.
And then I walk and there is space between
The four of us. We go where we have to go.
Did I dream it all, this ghostly scene,
The hundred-acre wood where the owl blinked
And the ass spoke? Where I am cosy and clean
In bed, but we are floating, our arms linked
Over the landscape? My father moves ahead
Of me, like some strange, almost extinct
Species, and I follow him in dread
Across the field towards my own extinction.
Spirits everywhere are drifting over blasted
Terrain. The winter cold makes no distinction
Between them and us. My father looks round
And smiles then turns away. We have no function
In this place but keep moving, without sound,
Lost figures who leave only a blank page
Behind them, and the dark and frozen ground
They pass across as they might cross a stage.
From: Reel
My Father Carries Me Across a Field
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