To future generations
2022 is drawing to a close. What kind of year is this? Even without the ability to predict the future, he almost dared to assert, “This is the year that people will talk about” – uttered the German poet Brecht, wars broke out again, the environment deteriorated, and many contradictions intensified. And it was 1940, when Germany launched an attack on more countries, Brecht recorded the tragedy in poetry: “The earth no longer produces, it devours. / The sky does not rain, only iron.”
Today I reread several of Brecht’s poems individually, from the section “Darkest Years (1938-1941)” in To Future Generations. Although Brecht left Germany physically after the spread of the war, his spirit was always in fear and grief. Poetry was his way of accusing and resisting that era. His poems are a reminder not to forget why we are suffering, and better not to repeat the same mistakes when darkness once again envelopes humanity.
Darkest Years (Excerpt)
Written by: Bertolt Brecht
Translator: Huang Canran
The world’s only hope
1
Is oppression as old as the moss by the pond?
Moss around the pond is inevitable.
Maybe everything I see is natural and I’m sick and want to get rid of that which cannot be removed?
I have read the songs of the Egyptians, those who built the pyramids. They complained about their burden and asked when the oppression would stop. That was four thousand years ago.
It seems that oppression, like moss, is inevitable.
2
When a child is about to be hit by a car, someone pushes him onto the sidewalk.
Not the kind people they built the monument for pushed him.
Anyone would push that kid out of that car.
But there’s a lot of people running over here, and a lot of people who pass by and don’t want to do it.
Is it because so many sufferers? Shouldn’t we help them more because there are so many of them? Instead, we help them less. Even the good people pass by, and then they are as good as they were when they didn’t pass.
3
In short, the more they suffered, the more natural their suffering seemed. Who will stop the fish in the sea from getting wet?
And the sufferers themselves treat themselves with this indifference and lack of kindness towards themselves.
How terrifying that human beings so easily endure the status quo, not only the suffering of strangers, but their own.
All those who think the world is so depraved refuse to appeal to one group of people to sympathize with another. But the sympathy of the oppressed for the oppressed is indispensable.
That is the only hope for the world.
The movie “Oasis”
I live at the moment
At the moment I live on the small island of Lidinge.
But one night not long ago
I had strange dreams, dreaming that I was in a city,
and find its street signs
All are German. I woke up
In a cold sweat, I saw the fir tree in front of my window
It was dark as night, so I breathed a sigh of relief, knowing
I am in a foreign country.
my son asked me
My younger son asked me: Should I learn arithmetic?
What do you learn to do, I want to say. Two slices of bread more than one
Sooner or later you will understand.
My younger son asked me: Should I learn French?
What do you learn to do, I want to say. That empire is sinking.
Touch your stomach with your hand and let out two groans
People know what you want.
My younger son asked me: Should I study history?
What do you learn to do, I want to say. Learn to dig your head into the soil
Maybe you can live.
Yeah, it’s time to learn arithmetic, I told him,
Learn French, learn history!
TV series “Our Fathers”
run away from my compatriots
run away from my compatriots
I have arrived in Finland. yesterday I
Friends who don’t know yet in a clean room
There are several beds. from the radio
I heard the scumbag’s victory. curiously
I looked at the map of the continent. High in Lapland,
towards the arctic ocean
I can still see a small door.
we are refugees now
we are refugees now
in Finland.
The little daughter came back at night complaining about the children
Don’t play with her. she is german from
The country of robbers.
speak up when I’m discussing with people
People want me to be quiet. they don’t like
man from the kingdom of robbers
speak loudly.
when i remind my little daughter
Germans are a nation of robbers
She’s as happy as I am that nobody loves them,
So we all laughed.
This is the year people will talk about
This is the year people will talk about,
It’s been a year of silence when people talk about it.
The old man watched the young man die.
Fools watch smart people die.
The earth no longer produces, it devours.
The sky does not rain, only iron.
Movie “1917”
To a pocket radio
You, the little box I carried on that journey,
I’m on the run from house to train, train to ship
Remember how to make sure your parts are not damaged,
so I can hear the abomination from the bedside
Nonsense and bring me pain, as bedtime
One last thing, again at the dawn of dawn,
Tracing their triumphs and my greatest fears:
At least promise me you won’t break again!
Refuge to Denmark
The house between the Sound and the pear tree,
A refugee engraved on you a long time ago
The phrase “truth is concrete”—
Do you know, have you ever escaped the bombing?
pipe
I hurried across the border with books
Throw it to friends, and throw poetry too,
But I bring a pipe, it’s against the refugee
Standard practice: Best to bring nothing.
Those books wait anxiously for a
It doesn’t matter what the jailer is closing in on his man.
His leather smoking pouch and other accessories
It seems to be more helpful to him now.
TV series “Our Fathers”
finnish landscape
Those waters where schools of fish swim! And lovely woods!
Berry and birch!
The wind in dense chords shakes the air gently,
So supple, as if rolling out of a white farmhouse
The clanging iron milk barrels are all open!
What I saw, heard, thought, and heard made the refugee under the alder tree
Dizzy, turn your attention back to
On his tiring task: continue to hope.
He noticed the corn piles and saw the animals veer off the road
Walk to the lake and hear the moo from their strong chests
But also understand who doesn’t have milk and corn.
Facing the barge carrying logs for sawing,
He asked: Is the wooden leg made of this?
It was only then that a nation was found to be silent in two languages.
(Above excerpted from To Future Generations,
Courtesy of Yazhong Culture｜Provided by Beijing United Publishing Company)
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