DER YIDDISH-VINKL March 10, 2006
Joan Braman continues to enrich the columns of Der Yiddish Vinkl with her Yiddish translations of English classics. This time her subject is…
Dover Beach
By Matthew Arnold
The sea is calm tonight
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
Listen! You hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
* * *|
* * *|
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.
Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! For the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confusing alarms of struggle and flight;
Where ignorant armies clash by night.
Dover-Yam
Der yam iz sheyn bay nakht
Di levone shaynt, shtark iz der fleyts
Oyfn frantsoyishn breg likht finklen un me’vakht;
Di scales fun Dover shteyen glantsndik un vays.
Un kukn arop oyf der bukhte, oyf a ruikn oyfn
Kum tsum fenster, vi frish di luft, du zest
Nor fun di khvalyes, es shpritst der shoym.
Vu yam un land trefn zikh tsunoyf;
Her zikh tsu tsu dem rash
Fun di khvalyes vos royshn ahin un tsurik
Un varfn di shteyndlekh aroyf oyf der plazhe;
Kumen un geyen vider un iber a mol
Runtslen in zeyer bazakhtn ritem
Un mit an eybikn troyerikn kol.
O lomir tsvey zayn getray
Vayl di velt zet oys vi zi bashteyt
Fun undzere khaloymes, ligt oysgeshpreyt,
Azoy farsheydn, sheyn, un nay,
Hot ober nit kayn freyd. Kayn libe, kayn likht,
Kayn emes, kayn sholem. Kayn hilf far payn;
Un do zaynen mir, vi oyf a pleyn
Vu s’kumt a khoyshekh un alts vert hefkerdik,
Un armeyen krign zikh umvisndik.
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