ABM -- Poem (in English): "Venus the Star" by Maksim Bahdanovich

This File Last Updated: 1999/09/25

Return to the Maksim Bahdanovich Web page Go to the A Belarus Miscellany Topic List Go to the top of section about Books Go to the Belarusian Writers Web page

Go to the Belarusian Language Version of this poem: Зорка Венера (Venus the Star)

Search the A Belarus Miscellany Web site

Venus the Star

(also known as "Romance")

by Maksim Bahdanovich (1912)

Vera Rich

Notes

Quand luira cette étoile un jour,
La plus belle et la plus lointaine,
Dites-lui qu’elle eut mon amour
0 derniers de la race humaine

[ When will shine this star one day,
The nicest and the most distant,
Say to her that she had my love
0 last of the human race ]
Sully Prudhomme.

Venus, new-risen above the broad skyline,
Brings with her bright-shining memories of love.
Do you recall, when we met for the first time
Venus new-risen above?

From that time forth, evermore skyward gazing,
Seeking that planet, I'd scan heaven o'er,
Within me, a deep silent love for you blazing,
From that time forth, evermore.

But the time of our parting draws near, ever nearer,
Thus does our fate, does our fortune appear;
Deeply, profoundly, I love you, my dear one,
But the time of our parting draws near.

In that far country, my love buried deeply,
I shall live drearily, yet high above
I shall gaze on that planet each night, vigil keeping,
In that far country, my love.

Gaze upon Venus once more, though far distant
One from another, there mingled we'll pour
Our glance, let love flower if but for an instant...
Gaze upon Venus once more!

Notes

The preceding is an updated translation, published in Manifold, No. 33, Autumn, 1999 (Corrigenda, page 33), and is copyright by Vera Rich (used here by permission). Ms. Rich states that this is the only version of her English translation of this poem that should be used. (Her original translation was rushed to the printers before it was ready.) The previously published translation is in Like Water, Like Fire (1971), pp. 73-74.
This poem is also very popular as the song, "Venus the Star" sung in Belarusian. The poem was originally published with the title "Romance" (1912), before its popularity as a song, beginning approximately in the 1930s.
To hear a recording of the Belarusian language version of the first verse of the popular song version, go to the Virtual Guide to Belarus (in "au" format).

Return to the Maksim Bahdanovich Web page Go to the A Belarus Miscellany Topic List Go to the top of section about Books Go to the Belarusian Writers Web page

Go to the Belarusian Language Version of this poem: Зорка Венера (Venus the Star)

Search the A Belarus Miscellany Web site