On March 16, 1882, Khrystyna Danylivna Alchevska gave birth to her fifth child. The daughter was named Khrystyna, after her mother.
Starting in 1902, she began to publish extensively in periodicals and literary and artistic almanacs. Her first collection of poems, which Ivan Franko himself highly praised, was published in Moscow in 1907.
Well, today we invite you to read another of her poetry collections, *From Galician and Our Literature*, published in Kharkiv in 1915.
Scatter on the wind, final leaves,
Scatter like the wind’s own breath!
Scatter, too—wounds, tears, and thoughts—
The anguish of a broken heart!
Who could see, in these withered leaves,
The forest’s splendor and bliss?
Who could discern, in my song of despair,
A rich, yet aching soul?!
Having squandered the treasures of youth,
And parted with hope’s last blade of grass,
Like a beggar, I walk a lonely path
To meet the death I crave….
I dreamt a prophetic dream: before me lay
A wilderness, wild and bare as an open field;
I stood there, chained to a granite crag,
And beside me, thousands—slaves just like myself…
And the voice of gods rang out from the heavens high:
“Take up your hammers! And move that mighty rock:
“Fear not the toil, the hardship, the cruel pain—
“Achieve this feat, and scatter the gloom away!”
And all as one, we swung our hammers high,
And rubble flew from the face of the stone;
We labored on with hands of working men,
And many fell from thirst and scorching heat…
Yet inch by inch, we won the ground like a battle fought;
We knew the day would come when we were gone,
But we would carve a path from darkness and despair
Into the arms of dawn, where the light would never fade!
And on we marched, steadfast as a fortress wall,
With mighty faith and hammers in our hands;
—Though we might be forgotten, we held a sacred goal—
The bliss of all mankind upon the paths of freedom!..
Slumber and hush, O silent sorrow!
The alders and willow-thickets quiver,
The moon has risen; eyes shine mutely
Like diamonds formed of evening tears…
Softly, more softly!… Heart, be still:—
The sun has set, the nightingale sleeps,
Stars shine in the clear expanse,
The brook weeps ceaselessly amidst the flowers…
Sleep peacefully, my sorrowful spirit:
The wind has settled, the trees are asleep,
The stars have faded in the firmament,
Shadows have stirred to life… The fields are hushed!
Begone, vanish, O dreary gloom:—
Enough of sadness, enough of wounds of the soul!
A yearning for the fields wanders in the stillness,
And mist has enshrouded the heart’s dreams…
I.
What splendor!… Oh, the land’s awakening!
— A mere year, a single moment—and slaves exist no more;
A youthful song is heard throughout the natural world,
Dark forces vanish, and evil gods are gone!…
…So sleeps the eagle in the mountains; then, opening its eyes,
It sees the boundless firmament before it,
And stirs, forgetting the kingdom of the night,
To fly toward the sea, toward the vast, turbulent waters!…
…So the sea sometimes slumbers in the dead of night,
Then suddenly wakes, beating the air like wings,
And rushes joyfully, heeding only the sun,
Riveting the gaze of all mankind upon freedom!…
II.
In a desolate and barren land,
In a realm of treason, a kingdom of darkness,
Forgotten by God and by men,
Stands a quiet altar of the people;
No fire blazes upon it now,
The path leading to it is overgrown,
And the throng of people offers no incense
To the gods…
Where, in this dread hour of oblivion,
Are the proud warriors of the fatherland?
Where are you, who whispered prayers
To the gods your fathers worshipped?
Have you gone blind? Have you forgotten
Where you were going, why, and whence you came?
Or did you fail to find the strength within
To cease being what you once were?!
I yearn for the sun, and my song
Floats like a cloud in the distance;
I live without warmth, utterly worn,
While the storm weeps over me.
Where is the land of bright thoughts and blazing fires?
Where are the dreams of spring and the sacred vows?
Ah, they have vanished; these steppes
Have buried me in a mist that offers no answer.
I yearn for the sun and I long to live;
I shall create all anew, though no light breaks through;
I will pay with my life for my mad, fevered dream—
But I shall kindle the radiance of the dawn!
The bright sun peered through the dark clouds…
It illuminated the vast expanses of the steppe
And awakened, for a moment, thoughts of freedom—
Of freedom, radiant and longed-for;
Songs were heard—passionate, liberated songs…
No iron chains could have held back those songs;
They flooded both villages and steppes
With a tide of boundless happiness…
They filled the forest and valleys with immense bliss
And stirred the ponds with joyful tidings of freedom;
The waters of the slumbering Black Sea trembled,
And the steppes breathed a sigh…
In that hour, the radiant dawn of freedom was sung
By the blue abysses of the beautiful sky above,
By somber folk, and by the children of the open fields—
The wildflowers…
And the wind, sweeping across the steppe and green oak grove,
Rustled and rustled, whispering of noble aspirations;
It rustled and proclaimed that freedom had awakened,
And sang the praises of its awakening!…
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