Károly Bari

Poems

Translated by Daniel Hoffman with Eszter Molnár

[...]

My Anguish Set Me on My Way

Kínom indított útnak

Chimney reeking raw poverty
with crumbling walls, wind-torn roof
my den hung in the world, knotted into misery up to the chin.

My anguish set me on my way,
across sun-baked fields,
and the cold depths of valleys,
to take my own measure,
to strike stars out of blood and perspiration,
to rip my cursing mother's malediction
off of my despoiled sixteen years.

The singed shirts of my hell-fire blood
clothed me as a stranger
through the scintillation of my past looms the house,
from which my obstinate belief drove me to solitude,
drove me out into the world from emblazoned poverty
to tear about in the wide world like a dragon.

My heartbeat spins fate out of its place,
the rags of memory blaze up rekindled,
my face freezes into my childhood,
bygone sorrows intrude into my days,
and I must be saddened, again and again fall back
into burnt-out past, threadbare memories.
[...]