Bacovian Seasons / Anotimpuri Bacoviene

[English]

BACOVIAN* SEASONS

I was sitting alone in a corner, waiting. The lamp lit the room. It was cold, and she wasn’t coming.

The branches of a tree were hitting the window, and the wind was pulling petal by petal the flowers still so young. I could see them touching the glass, and lingering a little, then sliding back into the night.

And so, my spring passed, and she never arrived.

Summer descended then. A long summer of waiting. And it was getting colder, and colder…

One night I hit the lamp and let it fall. Breaking, my life sunk into darkness too.

I sat in a corner and said nothing. I was cold. After a while I could not bear it anymore, and I started crying out loud: “I love her, I love her, I love her… Where is she?”. And the cold kept on shrouding over me. My cries withered cold on the walls, leaching wet in the corners. I could still hear them dripping from time to time, with a deafening sound on the floor that winched under their weight.

I was crouched and frozen, looking through the legs of the table how the wind was tearing the golden leaves. Autumn had arrived. The leaves would stop for a few seconds at the window, like staring at me, or maybe saying goodbye. Would tarry a little then disappear into the night.

The moon was up in sky, livid. Few rays of light were reaching the broken lamp. I sat there, crouched and cold, paler than the moon. I remembered how I used to cry for her: “I love her, I love her, I love her…” and how I only lived just to hear my own words, because her…

Now, even if she were to come, I could not be able to turn my eyes just to see her one more time, for even the echo of my words froze in slender icicles along the walls, and because the last sparkle of light inside me died.

It’s winter.

*George Bacovia – Romanian famous symbolistic poet whose poetry is known for its darkness. Some of his favourite topics were suffering, disease, tuberculosis, cemeteries, the bourgeois. One theme in his writings was the “decay” and the thirst of “integration in inorganic”. Frequent terms used for expressing the so well known “bacovian depressiveness” were death, purple, lead, mourning, funeral, wet, wind, autumn, winter, frozen, night, rain, grey. The most known poems of Bacovia are Lead and Lacustrine. But a good image can give names like Funeral March, Melancholy, Thaw, Yearning, Alone, Cold, Epitaph, Regret, Enough, Silence, Sic Transit, Requiem. A little bit of insight in his poetry can be given by lines like “Deep slept the lead coffins / And the lead flowers, and funeral clothing” (Lead), “For so many nights I hear raining / I hear the Matter cry” (Lacustrine), “And the heavy lead horizon / Snows grey” (Grey), “It snows terrific on the abattoir field / And warm blood pours down the ditch” (Winter picture), “Listen how heavy, from the depth / The Earth calls us to it” (Melancholy), “A girl coughs in the window / In the diseased dawn / And the handkerchief turned / Red like the falling leaves” (Dawn).

[Romanian]

ANOTIMPURI BACOVIENE

Stăteam singur într-un colţ, aşteptând. Lampa lumina încăperea. Era frig, iar ea nu mai venea.

Ramurile unui pom se izbeau în geam iar vântul smulgea petală cu petală florile încă tinere. Le vedeam lipindu-se de sticlă şi zăbovind câteva clipe, lunecând apoi în noapte.

Şi aşa trecu şi primăvara mea, iar ea nu a venit.

S-a lăsat apoi vara. O vară lungă, de aşteptare. Şi se făcea frig, tot mai frig…

Într-o noapte am lovit lampa şi am lăsat-o să cadă. Spărgându-se, şi lumea mea s-a scufundat în întuneric.

M-am aşezat într-un colţ şi nu am mai spus nimic. Îmi era frig. După un timp nu am mai putut rezista şi am început să strig: „O iubesc, o iubesc, o iubesc… unde e?”. Şi frigul se lăsa tot mai mult peste mine. Strigătele-mi se stinseră rece de pereţi, prelingându-se ud pe la colţuri. Le mai auzeam din când în când picurând cu un clinchet asurzitor pe podeaua ce scârţâia sub greutatea lor.

Stăteam ghemuit şi îngheţat privind printre picioarele mesei cum vântul smulge frunzele aurii. Venise toamna. Ele se opreau câteva clipe pe fereastră, privindu-mă parcă, sau spunându-mi adio. Zăboveau câteva clipe, dispărând apoi în noapte.

Luna se ridicase pe cer, lividă. Câteva raze pătrundeau până la cioburile lămpii. Stăteam acolo, ghemuit şi rece, mai palid decât luna. Îmi amintesc cum obişnuiam să strig: „O iubesc, o iubesc, o iubesc!” şi cum trăiam doar pentru a-mi auzi cuvintele, pentru că ea…

Acum, nici dacă ar mai veni nu aş mai putea să-mi întorc privirea măcar să o mai văd încă o dată, pentru că până şi ecoul cuvintelor mele a îngheţat în ţurţuri subţiri de-a lungul zidurilor şi pentru că în mine s-a stins şi ultima scânteie de lumină.

E iarnă.