Fraternity-Testvériség, 1941 (19. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1941-09-01 / 9. szám

16

TESTVÉRISÉG

AMERICA AND THE KOSSUTH ERA

— Amerika és a Kossuth-korszak —

TO LOUIS KOSSUTH

Light of our fathers’ eyes, and in our own

Star of the unsetting sunset! for thy name,

That on the front of noon was as a flame In the great year night twenty years agone When all the heavens of Europe shook and shone With stormy wind and lightning, keeps its fame And bears its witness all day through the same;

Nor for past days and great deeds past alone,

Kossuth, we praise thee as our Landor praised,

But that now too we know thy voice upraised,

Thy voice, the trumpet of the truth of God,

Thine hand, the thunder-bearer’s, raised to smite As with heaven’s lightning for a sword and rod Men’s heads abased before the Muscovite.

Algernon Charles Swineburne

Prom: Poems and Ballads

By Algernon Charles Swinburne London, 1878

¥

KOSSUTH

I

Empty of greatness! Kossuth, only thou,

With kindred spirits, may redeem the stain —

It cannot be thy efforts fall in vain.

We feel ’tis well — ’tis something, even now,

That empire sits, on one majestic brow;

Here is a clearer beacon for the free,

Than He, whose very name was victory:

Before this monarch let the phantoms bow.

He is our earth-king, let us haste to do His bidding — where the pure stars shine,

Let our faith follow — heroes guide us through The sunken shoals — they speak, in words divine,

“Twas said of yore, but I declare to you A nobler truth than those old creeds of thine.”

II

They gave thee welcome! Did it not surprise Thy quiet soul, in that tumultuous hour,

To meet such clamour? — Clouds begin to lour:

“They never knew the man-” — the fickle flies,

Hating the truth and loving pleasant lies,

Disown, deny thee —yet thou seem’st too great

For me to sing — since unrelenting fate

Finds thy faith firm, and golden words more wise.

What matters it their undiscerning gaze?

The herds that crouch beneath the heel of power,

Thor heedest not their murmur or their praise.

Better low music, or a dewy flower,

That wakes the memory of serener days,

In wastes thought of some far happy bower.

J. N.

From: Leaves, By J. N„ Edinburgh, 1854