Page:Anthology of Modern Slavonic Literature in Prose and Verse by Paul Selver.djvu/255

 

A mushroom for shield, and he peeps from the spinney,
Eager to seize on the stern arm of judgment,
The knight's tawny sword in the golden-wrought corselet.

I, Petr Bezruč, the Bezruč of Těšín,
Vagabond fiddler and piper of madness,
Lunatic rebel, and mettlesome songster,
Ill-omened owl on the turret of Těšín,
I play and I sing, while the hammers make thunder
From Witkowitz, Frydlant, and under Lipiny.
Around are rich men of a faith that I know not,
(O Petr Bezruč, how lovest thou them!)
Men who have names that are lordly and peerless,
Haughty as stars and lustrous as godheads;
(O Petr Bezruč, who shattered your home?)
Around there are women in velvet, in satin;
Around there are men, glorified, mighty,
In the city of gold, by the side of the Danube,
Around there are poets, from Vltava's marges,
The lovers of women, as Paris has bidden.
The string in despair 'neath the bow is aquiver,
The heavy sigh of the seventy thousand;
I sing to the stones and I play to the boulders,
I play and I sing.—will ye give me a kreutzer?