Sándor Weöres: Toccata

To my Friend Imre Bata

As I get older
I do find:
my life is clinging
to the past,

my roots are deep down
pulling me
while putting up with
history.

My childhood was:
imps and fairies;
not radio
or a TV,

horses and donkeys
had trotted,
automobiles were
rarity,

followed by fast
groups of children
in awe they chased,
and ran after.

The sky was empty,
a blue field,
no airplanes had put
streaks on it.

Railway cars or light:
the gleams of
far away little
train stations.

My fifty years
had plunged deeper:
from tales and fares,
I uncover,

from memories
I assemble
my grandfather,
great-grandfather,

I had long known
Klapka, Perczel,
my old brothers:
as I called them

because Rákóczi
or Drugeth
thought that I was an
old beggar.

How terribly old
I am! Then
Platon may have known
me even,

but I was an odd
character,
and he saw a boy
prettier.

When there was not
even a man,
fern shrub bending
over my head,

the shrub had called me
an old man.
When was I born then?
Not ever.

I carried two good
fistful of
dust easily from
creation,

roving nobody
is my name,
Maitreya, Amor,
also Love,

I have been here since
ancient times,
but will die with a
butterfly.

Translated by: Maria Bencsath