An Anthology of Croatian Literature

Vesna Parun (1922- )

Vesna Parun (1922– ) Female writers have appeared relatively late in the long history of Croatian literature, and the forerunner of them all, and among the best of them all, is Vesna Parun. She debuted, after World War II, a volume entitled Zore i vihori (Dawns and Whirlwinds, 1947), with intensely personal lyrics at a time when others were singing of socialism, and the Yugoslav literary establishment criticized her harshly for that. Nonetheless, she has remained resolutely productive into the twenty-first century with poetry on love, loss, nature, women, and the human condition in general. Parun has been abundantly and well translated into English. The following poems are taken from Dasha Čulić Nisula, ed. and trans., Selected Poems of Vesna Parun (University Center MI: Green River Press, 1985): 25, 97, 121. An Anthology of Croatian Literature 224 First Love In the rustling grass near the crossroads I sit with a restless heart and wait for him to whom last night I gave, innocently, the frightened bird of my love. In the glowing red moss of the hill the autumn is already entangled. The calmness of the lake grows out of partial shadows. What shall I do if the one to whom I gave my heart doesn’t come? (I handed him the heart as a bird without thinking anything, astonished.) The whisper of the night reaches from the dark fields. Oh, my heart! Do not listen to the murmur of the grass. It will lead you to grief. Look: water is changeable. And the birds depart far across the hill after the cold sun. A Rock on Which a Ballad Ought to be Engraved Let it be known that we haven’t always been sad: there is a moment when love and life become one. In a black stone one can decipher the earth’s dream. In a drop of rain on a leaf of the sullen fig tree the celebration of summer could last for centuries and the sun would never descend behind the bare shriveled hills. In one single name as in an old prayer hides the unhappy and too quiet sense of the world. As it has become paler, peace too has gone. The heart cannot build it again. Vesna Parun 225 And the thought is unable to search for it In the hatred of things that dispute one another. Time, why do you let us measure you with our forehead that has ceased to yearn. Love, we have measured you too with a false measure of the vacillating world. A Grain of Emotion I awake and whisper: love, be a song, then I’ll live with you, giving you to the people. And the people will return to me something from your leaves when they go out for a stroll through the streets washed in rain. Is there such a town where trees don’t die Is there such tenderness one obtains secretly on some long, long white staircase. I was good as summer and slender with thick tresses. I was magnificently good. I was like summer. I am not ashamed to say this; anyway, it is now autumn. Goodness lies below leaves and its smile is invisible. I was a forest. I was good as summer and slender, with thick tresses. And what has remained? This: a grain of emotion in the pupils. I awake and whisper: love, be a song! ...