Song V (Continued) pg. 26

Somebody else is happy with her

She gave her heart to another

For me, who is so fond of her

Only despair arose for me

            As relief for my torture

            When I find no way [out]

            I will make rest for my soul

            I will carry my sorrow to the grave

O Klara! Remember now

When you stand over my tomb

That boyfriend in that grave

To whom you were so loving

Now crushed by a stone

Your pity superfluous in the silence

Cold and deaf forever

For A Memory

Our youthful years will pass

The future is for us unknown

Even if it were the end of the world

You will always be my beloved

Song IV (Litwinka and Niemiec Continued) pg. 25

Sorrowful among the flowers

For she is seeking Niemiec, her darling

To Litwinka, sorrowful among Lithuanians

Because she fell in love with a foreign youth[1],

            With Niemiec, violently it stretches out [its] arms

            Rushes over the rocks and the wild expanses

            To press [his] lover[2] to his cold bosom

            Until they perish together in the depths of the sea

And you, similarly, a passerby will take away

From [your] paternal valleys, O poor Litwinka

And you will sink into the oblivion of the waves

But more sorrowful, but all alone

            The heart and the stream warn in vain

            The child loves, and the Vilija runs

            The Vilija flows [off] with [her] German lover

            The child cries in the hermitage tower

Song V

Unhappiness[3] rules my fate

I am worth pitying

She who possesses my heart

Does not feel a sigh for me

---

[1] Niemec= “German (boy)”

[2] Female form

[3] Or “misfortune”

Fate III (Continued) pg. 24

Experienced in many cares

To find out a friend is a traitor

In what was in the deepest shadows

That’s my fate

            [My] heart is in no way condemned

            But to be condemned by others

            To bring comfort to [my] fellows

            That’s my fate

O Death, shorten these bitter days

May they at last come to an end for me

Or give [me] the fulfillment of my desires

This is not a good fate

Song IV[1]

The Vilija[2], parent of our streams

[Its] bottom has an angry and clouded face

Beautiful Litwinka, who is scooping water from it

Has a pure heart more beautiful[3] than a berry

The Vilija, in the beautiful Kaunas Valley

Flows among the tulips and narcissus

Around[4] Litwinka, flower of our maidens[5]

More beautiful than the roses and than the tulips of the Vilija

---

[1] Song IV recounts the story of Litwinka and Niemiec, also a love tragedy.

[2] The Vilija flows west past Vilnius to join the Neman at Kaunas.

[3] Or “redder”

[4] The word translated as “around” is Ukrainian in origin.

[5] Literally “young people”

Song II (Continued) pg. 23

God, who in [His] grace established the power

And lovingly if thunderously[1] rules

            Seeing that virtue falls

            Creates love for it, as aid

            And heals even those wounds

            That friendship gives us

Fate III

To suffer eternally and shed tears

Drive out happinesses from the watery shadows

Oh, I will never catch up with them

That’s my fate

            To love the angel of goodness

            [My] eyes having recognized the illusion

            That no one could unite us

            That’s my fate

To beseech God for salvation[2]

You see[3] an enemy in every person

And to take on similar suffering

That’s my fate

---

[1] Literally “with a thunderbolt”

[2] Literally “rescue”

[3] Sic for “To see”

Song No. I (Lyrics to Traditional Songs) pg. 22

Song No. I[1]

A girl came out, she came out alone, like a rosy flower

Her eyes cried, she wringed her hands, her world was changing

She went through the dark[2] forest, beyond the lake, picked dry heather

(Into [her] hand) she cried pitifully, and sobbed from her heart, her voice rang with sorrow

Jaslo lies there, in wet clothing, in the lake beyond her

And has a chill in [his] heart, on the cold carpet, in a fatal sleep[3]

“I asked[4] my father, I asked my mother, ‘Give me Kasia’

They didn’t give me Kasia, they drove [me] out of the cottage, expelled [me] from the village”

I will go to him, to my Jaslo, I will kiss his temples

I will give him up forever, for ever and ever, I will squeeze his white hand

Fish splash in the distance, play, and in the water at the bottom

Already Kasia rests beside her Jaslo, oh, in a fatal sleep[5]

            The End

Song II

O love! Rule my days

Happy is he who knows you

You are a tiny piece [of things] on Earth

[And] the happiness[6] that rules in Heaven

            You are alone and constant

            You aspire to delight[7] without measure

---

[1] The following pages entitled “piesn” are referred to as “songs,” two of which tell a story. Song No. I tells the story of Kasia and Jaslo, a “Romeo and Juliet” style love tragedy. The Kasia and Jaslo story is a Polish folk tradition of some sort, as there is at least one folk song about a Kasia and Jaslo romance.

[2] Literally “grey”

[3] Or “dream”

[4] Male form

[5] Or “dream”

[6] Or “good fortune”

[7] Aspire to [a] delight without measure (“delight”= noun)

Leave-Taking pg. 21

Leave-Taking

Dear angel, oh, I take leave of you

We have to part

So give [me] again a kiss

For I am already off to a distant land

Ach! Och! Ech!

She was beautiful and blameless

She was so sweet as to be frightening

When I saw her for the first time

I cried out “Ach[1]!”

            When she talked to me for a little bit afterwards

            [saying] “My only love”

            Intoxicated by her caress

            I whispered “Och[2]!”

Now she has been my wife

Already for three years

So I just wave my hand

And say “Ech[3]!”

---

[1] Ooh, Aah!

[2] Ooh, Aah!

[3] Oh, well!

As A Memory pg. 20 (Zofia Krzyrzawska)

As A Memory

As many times in your life

As you have plucked a proud, beautiful flower

That many times, remember

Your lover’s tender[1] years

            I’m not seeking praises for mentioning the flower

            To ask you for friendship is my entire goal

            I sketch the latest in couplets[2] in my diary

            Like a swarm[3] of bees I feel feelings without end

I would like to write this whole diary [full]

But already it’s superfluous where[4] I stop

            And I just hold my breath[5] that it might come true

            That my desires might soon[6] be fulfilled

Zofia Krzyrzawska[7]!

Oh, if only you might have willing[8] love for me

Then you would give yourself [to me] to be kissed

---

[1] Literally “young”

[2] Literally “pairs”

[3] Literally “hive”

[4] Literally “when”

[5] Literally “inhale”

[6] Literally “quickly”

[7] Perhaps the author of the above poem, or the subject of the following poem.

[8] Literally “consenting,” “agreeing”

As A Memory (Continued) pg. 19

When I remember that I loved you, and that you loved me

At night I do not sleep, at night I dream, I think always of you

With this love, it will come someday to lying in the grave

If you loved only me, I wouldn’t have to reveal you

And I couldn’t live without you, I would love you in secret

Oh, if you only knew what my heart feels

As soon as you would tell me, I’d kiss you

And that, your sweet kiss, would sweeten my life

And I would tell no one that I loved you in secret

Longing!

Oh, my heart is sad, so sad

Why should I dream, long for, o, dream[1]!

Why, oh why did I choose one

Who can never be mine

            I go around crying[2] the whole beautiful day

            In the white window panes I see her shadow

            It pours a rain of feelings, it’s not so blissful

I go around like that day and night

---

[1] Or “sleep”

[2] Literally “and cry”

As A Memory pg. 18

As A Memory

When you have already abandoned that loving solitude

Where our lives flowed so sweetly

Remember this that I’m writing you

And mourn the happiness that’s already past

            Perhaps when your eyes catch sight of my letter

            Read it sweetly, remember

That I wish you well

Youth will not last long

            So play and be happy

Be merry always and everywhere

            Without cares, rush after experience

Like the cold stone leaning by the grave

Sometimes stops passersby with [its] inscription

So also my name, when you see this card

May you read [it] with tender eyes

            And when, after that, you have read through the page

            Then, when future years have come

Think about me, as if departed

And consider that here my heart is buried

For [My] Diary pg. 17

For [My] Diary[1]

To love! Oh, I will love forever

No one listens to my changes

[My] heart has been wounded forever

[My] heart has been wounded forever

            The wounds of the heart cannot be healed

            No one finds a way to cure [me]

            Death is perhaps the only help for me

            I will carry the memory of you to the grave

Oh, you! You will be at a distance from me

Perhaps you will not remember poor[2] [me]

Perhaps you will not remember even [my] name

Who is[3] fading so prematurely over you

            Our souls grow wines

            When the nightingale returns in spring

When it sends prayers to God from the grove

Oh! That’s as blissful as in paradise

But with that most sweet harmony

They create our melody

When we praise God

[And] love him with all [our] soul[4]

---

[1] Grammatical gender in Polish allows an adjective or past participle form to identify the party speaking or referred to as male or female. The author of the poem titled “For My Diary” refers to herself with a grammatically feminine adjective and is presumably female.

[2] Female form

[3] Female form

[4] The handwriting on this page appears to be slightly different from that of the preceding and following pages.

To [My] Sister! (Continued) pg. 16

Arrive, without bitter sorrow

At [your] intended goals

            Like spring, with an adornment of flowers

            Enchanting all of creation

            May the Creator sweeten the day

            Of [your] parents cares and dreams

Wherever you step, may a flower bloom

Whatever you start, may it succeed

May your cares greet happiness[1]

[And] may mine always blossom for you

            Fortune!

            Fortune turns like a deceptive wheel

            This one runs straight, that one pushes [you] aside

            One it harms, the other it caresses

            For another it pushes grief into life

But you, always, every day

Remember [your] boy friend

As abundantly much as they read[2] these lines

Look, well-wishing, on their author

[And] accept that much of my most loving thanks

Even if things could have separated us widely

---

[1] Or “good fortune”

[2] Sic for “you read”

Of Relatives! (Continued) pg. 15

If you would sincerely love me

Like a doe [loves] its children

I wish, for that, that you would have

As much happiness[1] as there is in the world

            To [My] Uncle!

I thought long, oh uncle

To maybe bring you gifts of some sort

But always had in [my] heart

More of a wreath of tenderness than offerings

            Sincere love, humility

            Everything that grows up from the mind[2]

            [I’m] not in a position to express [in words]

I will give [you] mutual love in a wreath

That which rewards virtue

For the space of your days, in turn

May [it] sweeten life for you

[And] not send [you] deceiving hopes

To [My] Sister!

Enjoy the sweeteness in life

Nonetheless [the sweetness] of a long life

---

[1] Or “good fortune”

[2] The word translated here as “mind” is Ukrainian/Russian in origin.