An Anthology of Modern Bohemian Poetry/Woe of Man
WOE OF MAN
We, 'neath the spell of a hostile power are by faintness assailed,
Its evil relentless face in the eyes of the sun is aglow;
The instrument of thy labour was cast from our hands as they quailed,
On a boulder amid the quarries we sat us down in our woe.
We wiped the sweat from our brows, with Death we were speaking.Amid
A motionless heaven aglow, 'mid ironical glinting of ore,
And e'en as a child lays its head in its mother's lap, so we hid
Our weary thoughts in creation's grief that endures evermore.
And then in our own magic power, the mystery of our birth,
In the guerdon of our renown that is hidden, our sorrows we found;
Princes, who in a conquering ruler's gold bearing earth,
Were lettered fast and by guards invisible compassed around.
When they think of their cities that over the lakes es have grown,
Of the stars in the mystical light of dusk of their native sky,
And in their captivity’s calm, of bells with a thousand-fold tone,
And of trusty multitudes, who at a crowning exultingly cry.
"The Hands" (1901).
This work is a translation and has a separate copyright status to the applicable copyright protections of the original content.
| Original: |
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1929. The longest-living author of this work died in 1929, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 94 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
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| Translation: |
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1929. The longest-living author of this work died in 1970, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 53 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
Public domainPublic domainfalsefalse |
