Arany János - Győrei Zsolt (szerk.): The trill of the nightingale (Budapest, 2019)

III - „His voice, once fine and heady, still a grumble deep” - Poem for an Occasion (Thomas Cooper)

Poem for an Occasion

The new year’s here (a shabby rag!),

And I must pen a rhyme to it,

And raise my glass and drink a toast To hail its coming, as is fit.

Yet could one wish for blessings more In an age as blessed as ours?

This new year may the Lord provide Whatever yet we’ve been denied.

May bread be cheap, and may the wheat Fetch prices high, may grain sell dear, And bullock turn a profit too,

The butcher have a prosperous year,

And marketgoers homeward bound Bear baskets sagging to the ground.

This new year may the Lord provide Whatever yet we’ve been denied.

Don’t burden any hapless souls With debts to pay or penury,

If burgher becomes mendicant,

Then let him win the lottery.

May upright men have coins to spare, And purses bulge until they tear.

This new year may the Lord provide Whatever yet we’ve been denied.

May every poor man’s swine live well, With trough filled to the brim with slop, May pestilence not pester us,

Nor plague nor cold wind blight the crop. Let doctor, hangman get their pay While resting from a tiring day.

This new year may the Lord provide Whatever yet we’ve been denied.