Fraternity-Testvériség, 1957 (35. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1957-05-01 / 5. szám
12 FRATERNITY MESSAGE FROM THE DANUBE-BEND Translated by Watson Kirkconnell from the Magyar of Tibor Tollas (At the penitentiary town of Vác, in central Hungary, the Danube River, after having flowed six hundred miles due east towards Russia, turns sharply and irrevocably south, and makes its way to the Euxine by way of Hungary, Jugoslavia, Bulgaria and Rumania. This is “the Big Bend”, which Tibor Tollas makes the symbol of an avoidance of doom in Soviet tyranny. He pleads rather for fellowship in freedom amongst all the peoples of the Danube Valley. — W. K.) Slowly beyond the walls above us rise The tonsured hills, with foreheads dark with sorrow. Great gravestones to dead Time they symbolize; They ruminate no more upon Tomorrow. The convict-prison, with its grey stone face, Reflects its body in the stream below Where centuries of annals we may trace Upon the shadowed waves that peaceful flow. Invisibly upon its back it bears Remembrance of old griefs and ancient spite: Here a belated child in terror stares, Here a stepmother drowns at dead of night. 0 queen of rivers, mother of small nations, Valley beloved through a thousand years, My home across the Continent’s foundations — Be thou an arm that holds, no knife that shears. Our human UNITY has been divided In pieces, like a window full of gratings. By Hatred — We each other have derided, Poor slaves between two giants, in our hatings. 1 see the river flow . . . From West to East It bears the sunlight; then I mark a bend. It turns abruptly south, the view has ceased; It goes not East, that journey’s at an end.
