A mother's lament for her drowned son - Anonymous

Alas, alas thine empty seat, my son!

Vainly thy garments I did toil to dry.

Thy mother's joy is clouded o'er with grief,

And darkness veils the lonely sky.

How oft I watched with straining eye for thee,

And saw thee rowing swiftly o'er the wave;

Wiser than all thy race, my noble boy,

And than the bravest still more brave.

Never with empty hand didst thou return,

But now I mourn thine empty hand and place;

Alas, how useless seems the world to me,

Since I no more behold thy face!

Friends, could I weep as ye are weeping now,

It were some comfort to my breaking heart;

The fever burns my brow, my sight is dim,

The anguish is too deep for tears to start.

Death, death alone can now be good to me;

Life is a loathsome thing, and I would go,

Far, far away from Greenland's rocky coast,

Its icy waves and fields of sparkling snow.

Take me, sweet Death, to thy divine embrace,

Seal with deep slumber every aching sense;

The world is empty and the stars are dust,

They hold no love for me. I would go hence.

---

Anonymous (date unknown) Greenland

Translated by Frederic Rowland Marvin

Source: Flowers of song from many lands; being short poems and detached verses gathered from various languages and rendered into English by Frederic Rowland Marvin, Pafraets Book Company, 1902