O Fallada, da du hangest (Ein Pferd klagt an)
Ernst Busch| Traduzione inglese da Subject: Hanns Eisler | |
| Malgré mon épuisement, je tirais ma charrette Jusqu'à l'avenue de Francfort. Là je me dis : Houla ! Quelle fatigue ! Si je me laisse aller Il pourrait bien m'arriver que je m'effondre sur place. Dix minutes plus tard, il ne restait que mes os au milieu de la rue. A peine m'étais-je effondré au sol (Le cocher était parti téléphoner) Que des gens affamés surgirent des maisons En quête d'un morceau de viande. Avec leurs couteaux, ils m'extirpèrent la chair des os, Et moi j'étais encore vivant. Mais je les connaissais déjà, les humains. Ils m'apportaient des sacs pour me protéger des mouches M'offraient du pain sec, et incitaient mon cocher à se montrer doux envers moi. Jadis si gentils, et aujourd'hui si sauvages ! Ah, que leur était-il donc arrivé ? Alors je me demandai : Quelle douche froide les a donc frappés ? Qui les maltraite, pour qu'ils en soient tellement affectés ? Alors aidez les donc ! Et vite ! Sinon il vous arrivera quelque chose, que vous ne tenez pas pour possible. | O FALLADA, THERE YOU ARE HANGING I tugged at my wagon, though I felt so feeble And stopped in a street in our East End. I stood there and thought: My friend, you are so feeble. If you don't make an effort you'll start collapsing in front of all these people— Twenty minutes later I was nothing but a heap of bones in the roadway! And while I was lying collapsed in the darkness (my driver ran to telephone) a horde of hungry people appeared out of the doorways, started frantically trying each to be first to cut the meat from my carcase and they saw that I was still alive, and very far from finished with dying. But all these people, I thought, were once my familiars. They used to bring sacks to help me keep off the flies, gave me old crusts to eat, and came up to advise my driver that he must not beat me. Once so kind-hearted, and now they're turned to killers! What on earth can they have been through that would make them change their ways so completely? That led me to ask: who has sent such coldness right into the heart of the human race? What's blowing into their face so as to make them grow so freezing? Please come to their aid, and act now with boldness, or the consequences could well be beyond all reason. |
