# The Kobzar of the Ukraine/To the Dead

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To the Dead
And the Living, and the Unborn, Country- men of mine, in Ukraine, or out of it, My Epistle of Friendship.
This is the national poem of the Ukrainians, recited at all their gatherings. I have given the thought and something of the feeling. The music of the original I could not give. It begins like a Highland dirge with wailing amphibrachs, and there are other measures in it not used in our language. Perhaps some future student may be moved to put this poem in such English form as will give the true impression of the original.
The motive of the poem is, in part, to awaken the conscience of the young educated Ukrainians who, for the sake of gain were allowing themselves to be used as tools by foreign oppressors.
'TWAS dawn, 'tis evening light, So passes Day divine. Again the weary folk And all things earthly Take their rest. I alone, remorseful For my country's woes, Weep day and night, By the thronged cross-roads, Unheeded by all. They see not, they know not; Deaf ears, they hear not. They trade old fetters for new And barter righteousness, Make nothing of their God. They harness the people With heavy yokes. Evil they plough, With evil they sow. What crops will spring? What harvest will you see?
Arouse ye, unnatural ones. Children of Herod! Look on this calm Eden. Your own Ukraine, Bestow on her tender love. Mighty in her ruins. Break your fetters. Join in brotherhood. Seek not in foreign lands
Things that are not. Nor yet in Heaven, Nor in stranger's fields, But in your own house Lies your righteousness, Your strength and your liberty.
In the world is but one Ukraine, Dnieper—there is only one. But you must off to foreign lands To look for something grand and good. Wealth of goodness and liberty, Fraternity and so forth, you found. And back you brought to Ukraine From places far away A wondrous force of lofty sounding words, And nothing more. Shout aloud That God created you for this, To bow the knee to lies, To bend and bend again Your spineless backs And skin again Your brothers— These ignorant buckwheat farmers.
Try again to ripen crops of truth and light In Germany or some other foreign place If one should add
all our present misery To the wealth Our fathers stole Orphaned, indeed, would Dnieper be with all his holy hills. Faugh! if it should happen that you would never come back, Or get snuffed out just where you were spawned No children would weep nor mothers lament, Nor in God's house be heard the story of your shame. The sun would not shine on the stench of your filth O'er the clean, broad, free land, Nor would the people know what eagles you were Nor turn their heads to gaze.
Arouse ye, be men! For evil days come. Quickly a people enchained Shall tear off their fetters; Judgment will come, Dnieper and the hills will speak. A hundred rivers flow to the sea with your children's blood, Nor will there be any to help.
Smoke clouds hide the sun Through the ages Your sons shall curse you.
Wash yourselves— The divine likeness in you defile not with slime. Befool not your children that they were born to the world to be lordlings. The eyes of men untaught see deep, deep into your soul. Poor things they may be, yet they know the ass in the lion's skin. And they will judge you, the foolish will pronounce the doom of the wise.
II.
Did you but study as you should, You would possess your own wisdom; And you might creep up to heaven.
But it is we— Oh, no, not we; It is I—no, no, not I. I've seen it all, I know it. There's neither heaven nor hell, Not even God— Just I and the short, fat German, Nothing more.
Grand, my brother. You ask me something, "I don't know, Ask the German, He'll tell you." That's the way you learn in foreign lands. The German says— "You are Mongols. Mongols, Mongols; Naked children of the golden Tamerlane." The German says— "You are Slavs, Slavs, Slavs;
Ugly offspring of famous ancestors." You read the writings of the great Slavophils, Push in among them, Get on so well That you know all the tongues of the Slavonic peoples Except your own—God help it. "Oh, as for that Sometime we'll speak our own language When the German shows us how, Our history too, he will explain, Then we'll be alright!" It came about finely on the German advice. They learned to speak so well That even the mighty German could not understand them, Not to speak of common folks. Oh what a noise and racket! "There's Harmony, and Force And Music—and everything. And as for History The Epic of a free people! What's all this about the poor Romans, Brutus, etcetera, and the Devil knows what? Have we not our Brutuses
and our Cocles Glorious and never to be forgotten? Why freedom grew up with us Bathed in the Dnieper Rested her head on our hills, The far-flung Steppes are her garments." Alas! 'twas in blood she bathed Pillowed her head on burial mounds On bodies of Cossack freemen, Corpses despoiled. But look ye well Read again of that glory! Read it, word by word, Miss not a jot nor tittle, Grasp it all: Then ask yourselves— Who are we? Whose sons? Of what fathers? By whom and why enchained? Then you shall see Who your glorious Brutuses are. Slaves, door-mats! mud of Moscow scum of Warsaw are your lords; Glorious heroes they are. Why are you so proud Sons of unhappy Ukraine. That you go so well under the yoke? Even better you go
than your fathers went. Don't brag so much, they just skin you, They rendered out your fathers' bones Perhaps you are proud that your brotherhood has defended the faith. You cooked your dough-nuts o'er the fires of burning Turkish towns, of Sinope and Trebizond. True for you And you ate them And now they pain you. And on your own fields the wily German plants potatoes. You buy them from him, eat them for the good of your health and praise Cossackery. But with whose blood was the land sprinkled that grew the potatoes? Oh, that's a trifle; so long as it's good for the garden. Very proud you are that we once destroyed Poland. Very true indeed: Poland fell, but fell on top of us.
So your fathers shed their blood for Moscow and for Warsaw, And left to you, their sons their fetters and their glory.
III.
TO the very limit has our country come, Her own children crucify her worse than the Poles. How like beer they draw off her righteous blood. They would, you see enlighten the maternal eyes with everlasting fires; Lead on the poor blind cripple after the spirit of the age, German fashion! Fine, go ahead, show us the way! Let the old mother learn how to look after such children Show away! For this instruction, Don't worry— Good motherly reward will be. The illusion fades from your greedy eyes Glory shall you see, such glory as fits the sons of deceitful sires.
To study then, my brothers. Think and read.
Learn from the foreigner Despise not your own. Who forgets his mother Him God will punish. Foreigners will despise him Nor admit him to their homes; His children shall as strangers be Nor shall he find happiness on earth. I weep when I remember the deeds of our fathers, deeds I can not forget. Heavy on my heart they lie; Half my life I'd give could I forget them. Such is our glory the glory of Ukraine. So read then that ye may see Not in dream but in vision All the wrongs that lie beneath yon mighty tombs. Ask then of the martyrs by whom, when and for what were they crucified. Embrace then brothers mine— The least of your brethren. That your mother may smile again, Smile through her tears.
Give blessings to your children with hard toiler's hands; With free lips kiss them when they are washed and clad. Forget the shameful past And the true glory shall live again, the glory of the Ukraine. And clear light of day not twilight gloom Shall gently shine. Love one another, my brothers, I pray you—I plead.