For you have suffered rain and cold

Oh come and turn against me now
you monsters lurking, craving
and break your upward slanting way
through corridors that cave in,
come, push unhindered and unchecked,
with “fire,fire!” on your lips,
invade the vastness of my nights
that cover you in heaps.

Come, tear off all that I have on,
don’t fail to strip me naked,
just take away my eyes and lips,
yours is my forehead, take it,
for you have suffered rain and cold
and starved in me so oft,
though rain and cold I’ve suffered too
with no food for me left.

Stammering din of victory,
a rebellion no one stifles,
like convicts’ tumult in a jail,
a mutiny of lifers!
A moment of keen happiness,
the last and first one ever:
there like a forest all aflame
I will but stand and quiver.

Janos Pilinszky – Translated by Istvan Totfalusi