The Soul Of A Century/Three horsemen

by Jaroslav Vrchlický

THREE HORSEMEN

 

Three horsemen rode where the aged oak trees spread,
Rode through the marshes, dark clouds overhead.
The crimson sunset, tinged the skies aglow
While the first man spoke his woe in accents slow.

“Never before have I so feared the fray
But I’ve left my sister home alone today.
She is so young, oh endless grief and woes,
If she should fall into some stranger’s throes.”

Another cloud sped ’cross the heaven’s bleak,
And the second horseman thus began to speak:

“A sister’s grieving heart will cease to bleed,
Soon as she hears her lover’s pawing steed.
I am worse off . . I left my wife at home,
I dread to think of her, as thus I roam.
And children too . . my heart is torn apart,
One in her arms, another beneath her heart.
As bitter as the fruits the hawthornes bear
Are children raised without paternal care.”

’Twas not the wind that ’twixt the mountains stole,
But the weeping of the third man’s tortured soul.

“I dare say, sister, wife, ’tis hard to bear,
But I was forced to leave my mother there.
Poor aged mother, she is so weak and bent,
Like the willows that along the brook lament.
Her eyes will weep ’till there’ll be tears no more,
For I have never left my home before.
’Mid tears I think of her with every breath,
Who’ll close her eyes when she is called by Death?”

And in the stillness, on and on they ride,
Through darkened bogs and barren rocks beside.
And ere the moon spilled o’er the river’s shore,
The first man of his sister thinks no more.
And when the battle cry is heard at last,
The second horseman’s forehead brightens fast.
The hostile camp at length is set ablaze,
And still the third man sobs as through a haze.
And ere the fogs conceal the setting sun,
The bloody battle has been fought and won.

An eagle cleft the first man’s skull in two,
And quenched his thirst in the freshly fallen dew.

Beneath the brush, where skulks the hungry beast,
The second man was dragged for a wolf’s feast.

But the third man bore the banner on to fame,
And died, still whispering his mother’s name.

And since he thinks of her, even though dead,
A snowball tree grew out his moss decked bed.
And on the tree a snow-white bird had flown,
And sang . . . The blooms and leaves again have grown,
The white bird sings, through night’s dominion.
“My child” . . “Oh mother” . . What reunion!