Hopeless (Gypsy Song) - Elena Văcărescu

Into the mist I gazed, and fear came on me.
Then said the mist: “I weep for the lost sun.”

We sat beneath our tent;
Then he that hath no hope drew near us there,
And sat him down by us.
We asked him: “Hast thou seen the plains, the mountains?”
And he made answer: “I have seen them all.”
And then his cloak he showed us, and his shirt,
Torn was the shirt, there, close above the heart,
Pierced was the breast, there, close above the heart —
            The heart was gone.
And yet he trembled not, the while we looked,
And sought the heart, the heart that was not there.
He let us look. And he that had no hope
Smiled, that we grew so pale, and sang us songs.
Then we did envy him, that he could sing,
Without a heart to suffer what he sang.
And when he went, he cast his cloak about him.
And those that met him, they could never guess
How that his shirt was torn above the heart,
And that his breast was pierced above the heart,
            And that the heart was gone.

I gazed into the mist, and fear came on me.
Then said the mist: “I weep for the lost sun.”

---

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