George Gömöri
A letter of Cyprian Norwid’s from New York
If it chanced that, defying many a storm,
our sailing-ship crossed the ocean and
I reached dry land again after sixty days,
and if, later, the big splinter that wounded my thumb
failed to cripple me, so I could draw again –
if God had preserved me in these ways, perhaps he has
some other plan for me. In the Crimea, say,
I’d be happy to take up arms against the helots
serving the Frost Colossus, or to aid our cause elsewhere.
Please help me, You or some other wealthy Pole,
to get back soon to that Old World of ours.
There are all kinds of things in the papers here
and you can’t really tell what the truth is.
Kossuth, of course, was splendidly received,
but you’ve got to be defeated and a famous exile
to qualify for such treatment. As for me,
I work as an artist here, but unknown and lonely –
my windows look out on to a cemetery –
above the bushes humming-birds flutter and sometimes
a heavy scent of flowers comes wafting by . . .
In my thoughts, though, I’m wandering in Paris
or better still in Rome, where the past’s alive
and consoles – where you live not just for the present,
not only for the Market.
Translated by Clive WilmerGeorge Gömöri
Page(s) 141-142
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The