From day to day...
("Mynajutj dni, mynajutj nochi")
From day to day, from night to night
My summer passes; autumn croctps
Nearer; before mine eyes the light
Fades out; my soul is blind and sleeps.
Everything sleeps; and I ponder:
Do I yet live, or do I wander,
A dead thing, through my term of years,
A void of laughter as of tears?
Come to me, my fate! Where art thou?
Oh, I have, no fate.
God,if Thou dost scorn to love me,
Grant me but Thy hate!
Only let my heart not wither
Slowly, day by day,
Useless as a fallen tree-trunk
Rotting by the way.
Let me live, and live in spirit
Loving all mankind;
Or, if not, then let my curses
Strike the sunlight blind.
Wretched is the fettered captive,
Dying, and a slave;
But more wretched he that, living,
Sleeps, as in a grave,
Till he falls asleep for ever,
Leoving not a sign
That there faded into darkness
Something once divine.
Come to me, my fate! Where art thou?
Oh, I have no fate.
God, if Thou dost scorn to love me,
Grant me hut Thy hate!
Taras Shevchenko
"Mynajutj dni, mynajutj nochi"
("Минають дні, минають ночі")
1845, V'junyshhe (В’юнище)
Translated by T. L. Voynich
Original publication:
Taras Shevchenko. Zibrannja tvoriv: U 6 t. — K., 2003. — T. 1: Poezija 1837-1847. — S. 367; S. 749
Source:
Taras Shevchenko. Works. Volume 12. Shevchenko's poetry in translations.
Edited by Bolidan Krawciw. Printed by Mykola Denysiuk Printing Company
Chicago, Illinois — USA, 1963, page 47.