Gevorg Emin (Born 1919)
To The Future
Help me find the right way to be taken,
If I'm sleeping - early to awaken,
If engaged in work - not to be lazy;
Not to break through open doors like crazy;
When a task is uncompleted - not to shirk,
Not to say too soon - I've done my work.
Not to boast that I'm with passion surging,
Not to claim fame, when it's just emerging,
Not to bawl out songs still raw and sorry,
Not to brag of stones still in the quarry,
Not to boast a home before I've built it,
Nor of joy and wealth that shall have'filled it.
Not to pose as righteous and judicious
If I have been stupid and malicious;
To atone .for sins if I have erred,
For atonement not to seek reward.
Help me live my life as humans should,
Help me always to be just and good!
Over Ancient Manuscripts
I dreamed I was a monk of St. Mugni.*
I couldn't sleep - dark thoughts tormented me;
Gevorg of Ashtarak, chronicler, painter, bard,
I tossed about upon my bedstead hard,
Lover of light, sworn enemy of gloom,
I struggled with my doubts in my dark room.
First among sinners, hindmost among saints,
I lay and prayed, forsaking pen and paints.
How had it happened, heaven only knows:
Instead of frankincense, I wrote about a rose.
Instead of glorying the tree of crucifixion,
I gave the tree of life rhymed benediction.
Instead of your pure eyes, O Virgin Mary,
I drew the eyes of Khumar from the dairy
Upon the Gospels. Then the Lives of Sairits,
Instead of illustrating, with complaints
To the Almighty Saviour I amended.
Here too my list of sins was not yet ended;
Wine I called holy myrrh, and further sinned,
Extolling picnics on the grass in May's soft wind.
I kept ungodly writings in my cell;
Not only kept, but read them through as well.
Tomorrow morn, when nine shows on the dial,
Before the Holy Synod I stand trial.
Long centuries have passed, and more will pass.
How many rockets sped off to the stars!
Owls hoot among the ruins of Mugni,
Yet still I cannot sleep - thoughts torture me.
Gevorg of Ashtarak, bard, chronicler and painter,
I'm still the same, my heart has not grown fainter,
Lover of light, sworn enemy of gloom,
I lie and fight with phantoms in my room.
* Monastery of St. Mugni on Lake Sevan.
My heart is full of love for you, Armenia
My heart is full of love for you, Armenia,
Your winding roads, your songs, your poplar trees,
The eagle's flight above your groves perennial,
Your valleys breathing with eternity,
Your rivers foaming from time immemorial,
My village friends, hay-making in the dew,
These mountain chains, like towering memorials,
Memorials, my Motherland, to you!
I love the nights in winter, spring and summertime,
I love this life - its joys, its stress, its strife,
But if they try to take away Armenia,
I'll fall in love with Death in the name of Life!
I'm An Armenian
I'm an Armenian, as old as Ararat;
My shoes were wetted by the waters of the Flood.
Beside these shining peaks where Noah sat
My sword once drew the dread Bel's* evil blood.
These boulders overgrown with moss since time
Beyond remembrance, my hand hewed to lie
In the foundation of an ancient shrine
Which my own blood I shed to sanctify.
One morning here, in Ararat's green valley
My hammer and my pick aside I flung
And lit a fire on the Chaldean altar.
Those days both Ararat and I were young.
Then crimson every valley-flower was dyed;
All we had sown in it through ages past
Grew on the blood of countrymen who died.
Beneath each hillock killed Armenians rest.
With trusty shield I met attacking hordes,
Suffering countless wounds from countless swords.
I'm an Armenian, as old as Ararat.
High as the hills I bear my head. My story's sad:
Each century that passed brought grief to me.
My sons throughout the whole wide world were scattered;
With bloody showers Ararat was spattered.
My ploughlands crops of misery would yield.
I lived and breathed among my burned-out fields
On wasteland rubble, ashes steeped in gore.
But now, with my own blood revived once more,
Again the holy altar-lights burn bright,
Warming my heart and gladdening my sight.
New ploughshares out of rusted swords I forged;
Our fathers' heritage to my children I gave back.
Our sorrow fills my verse with hot blood gorged.
A twentieth century Gregory Narek**
I'm an Armenian, as old as Ararat.
Beneath my sorrows Ararat itself would bow.
Any ill-omened, blood-thirsty Attila that
Arose in history, would deal me his first blow.
Inured to massacres, I lived in thrall for ages.
An orphan, in the fight for life I'm steeled.
My thousand-year-old grain, preserved by hearts courageous,
Sown in new times, sprouts in my virgin fields.
Blessed be my roots, whose strength is marvelled at!
A homeless outcast once, a motherland have I.
I'm an Armenian, as old as Ararat.
I hold my head as high as eagles fly.
