Song of the Fire - Elena Văcărescu

I consumed the deep, green forest,
      With all its songs;
And now the songs of the forest,
      All sing aloud in me.

I watched the maiden spinning;
      I love a maiden’s distaff,
      I love her spindle,
That ceaseless flieth, still to be caught back,
For every flying, and yet never free.
Then said I: Maiden, why dost watch me so,
and not thy dancing spindle?
Why dost thou hearken only to my songs,
And never sing thine own?
Out there, the day has wedded with the night.
And the moon slyly smiled to see that wedding.
Whereat the birds grew dumb.
The maiden looks at me.
Instead of looking out, and wondering
At the great wedding of the day and night.
Child, child, now hear my song!
I dearly love dear love!
And thou, too, lovest love;
Wouldst sing thyself, and never hear my songs
But that thou lovest love.
The deep green forest, that I did consume,
He told me that a lovely thing was love,
There in the deep green forest.
Yet he said likewise, for he is not jealous,
That on the river banks,
And beneath the cottage roofs,
Most lovely, too, is love,
And that in maidens’ hearts it makes its dwelling,
Wherein it is much warmer, warmer far,
Than thou art, here by me,
Or than mine own soul, that is warmth itself!
The forest thinks, too, that the laughing spring,
            Who is his all-in-all,
Is nobody and naught compared with love;
And that he were to blame for growing green
In spring, except love asked him to grow green.
The forest thinks that tears would die away,
If all had love, as ev’ry nest hath eggs,
And ev’ry head of maize its feathery cap.

All this the forest told me
And bade me tell it thee;
The forest I consumed, and who the while,
Struggling in death-throes, sang the price of love.
Maiden, that sendest flying
and callest back thy spindle,
I have consumed the forest,
            With all its songs,
And all the songs of the forest
            Now sing in me.

---

Elena (Hélène) Văcărescu (1884 - 1947) Romania
Translated by Carmen Sylva and Alma Strettel
Source: The Bard of the Dimbovitza, Roumanian Folk-Songs Collected from the Peasants by Hélène Vacaresco, translated by Carmen Sylva and Alma Strettel; James R. Osgood, McIlvaine & Co., 1897