O Mtatsminda ! Thou Holy Mount ! the sight does haunt
The soul to thought - a place that wilderness has wrought
The dew divine like drops of pearl does grace the site
And, trembling, mingles in delight with soft twilight.

Both solitude and silence rule the place in proud and haughty state!
And from that mount my eyes behold a scene that rapture does create!
Below, the plain with ambrosial flowers is like a heavenly altar spread;
The fragrance like the incense sweet its blessings on the Mount does shed.

I still recall that lovely eve when full of grief
Your paths I trod, O dusky Mount, to seek relief;
My lonely soul in longing clung to twilight fair,
Which sorrow veiled with heaving sighs and beauty rare!

Ah! Nature wove a gentle dream of loveliness and sadness there.
O sky! O sky! You has engraved your image on my heart forever!
And when I gaze upon your blue my thoughts enraptured towards your fly
Alas, they cannot reach your heights, and in the air dissolve and die

Your radiance conceals this fleeting world of woes!
Beyond your realm my soul takes wing to seek repose
From dreary haunts where every cherished hope expires...
But woe! the gods shun man and all his heart's desires.

In pensive thought entranced I viewed the waning of the heaven's glow;
Soft twilight wrapt me in her arms and filled with dusk the glens below,
Where rivulets hummed in low response to gentle winds that haunting sighed;
My soul to nature seemed to cleave, and in her bosom's depth to bide.

O glowing Mount! whose smiles and tears enthrall the breast;
A sight that cheers the heavy heart by cares oppressed.
My grieving soul with gladness now does seem to blend,
And yet, O Mount, your silent mourn'st, my gentle friend.

Deep silence quivered in delight as twilight dimmed the heaven's dome;
And eve's sweet star of love and dreams pursued the moon throughout the gloam.
O have you seen a virgin soul, aweary with excess of prayer?
And so the pale and languid moon came floating through the misty air.

Remembrance brings to mind again that eve in May
When twilight veiled the Holy Mount in purple gray,
When over-burdened and distressed, the soul in pain,
Found vent in thoughts that ever in my heart remain.

O lovely eve! your solitude does soothe the soul by sorrow prest!
To you I baste when anguish floods the frenzied brain and burning breast!
The sorrowed heart - the saddened heart - will find its balm and hope in thee,
For morn will break and sunshine's beam will make the shades of darkness flee.








The wood is decked in light green leaf.
The swallow twitters in delight.
The lonely vine sheds joyous tears
Of interwoven dew and light.
Spring weaves a gown of green to clad
The mountain height and wide-spread field.
O when wilt thou, my native land,
In all thy glory stand revealed?








  The wood is clothed in leaf?
The swallow twitters again,
In the garden the solitary vinestem
Weeps with excess of joy.

The mead is in bloom,
The mountains blossom,
O beloved fatherland
Why dost thou not bloom?


Ilia Chavchavadze
Works
Translated by Marjory and Oliver Wardrops
Ganatleba Publishers
Tbilisi 1987

 

The full-orbed moon her lustre sheds
And floods the land with lambent light.
The snowy ridge of distant mounts
Dissolves into the heavens bright.
Deep quiet holds the breath of night;
My mother-land in silence lies,
Yet oft is heard an anguished moan
As Georgia in her slumber sighs.
I stand alone... The mountains, shades,
The slumber of my land caress.
O God! O God! when will we wake
And rise again to happiness?









  The pale light of the full moon
Was streaming on the fatherland
And its white ray among the mountains
Hovered in deep blue space.

Nowhere a sound, nowhere a cry
Nothing born of parents stirred
Save sometimes crying in pain
Some Georgian sobbing in his sleep was heard.

Again alone... and the mountain's shade
Caressed my native land in sleep
Still sleep O God! Sleep, always sleep
When shalt thou deem us worthy to awake?


Ilia Chavchavadze
Works
Translated by Marjory and Oliver Wardrops
Ganatleba Publishers
Tbilisi 1987

 

O Georgian mother! Thou gavest sons
To home and land in days of yore.
The future braves were lulled to sleep
With lullabies and mountain lore.
Alas! those days are past, and now
By sorrow is thy country swayed.
Thy very breath of life is fled.
Thy warrior son is now a shade.
Where is the courage of our sires,
The dagger and the crushing blow,
The honour and the pride of old,
The fearless struggle with the foe?
But why should we shed idle tears
For glory that is past and gone;
Another star, O Georgians, must
We find to guide and lead us on.
It is our duty to prepare
The future for the people, and —
Ah here, O mother, is thy task,
Thy sacred duty to thy land:
Endow thy sons with spirits strong,
With strength of heart and honour bright,
Inspire them with fraternal love,
To strive for freedom and for right;
Infuse in them God's Gospel wise,
Give them true courage for the fight,
And thus enrich our land with sons
Who'll change this darkness into light.
O mother! hear thy country's plea:
Nurture thy sons with spirits strong
Led by the torch of truth whose flame
Will banish ignorance and wrong.

Beneath the lake of Bazaleti
A golden cradle gleams;
Around it blooms a wondrous garden —
A paradise it seems.
This hidden bower, thus veiled by waters,
Dwells in eternity;
It knows no time, nor sun, nor moonlight,
No withered mortality.
No biting frosts, no scorching sun
Wither its bloom away,
For in this realm of golden shade
Eternal spring holds sway.
Within the bosom of that lake
A golden cradle lies;
No mortal yet has ever dared
To reach this paradise.
With streaming hair, the sirens fair
About this cradle throng;
They sweetly hum and weave love's snare
In soft delusive song.
'Tis said that glorious Queen Tamari
Had placed the cradle so,
And o'er it poured the tears a nation
Had shed in anguished woe.
But none can say what nameless babe
Is cradled there below,
Or why a nation's tears conceal
It there in endless flow...
Perhaps it holds and cradles one
Whose name none dares to speak —
A nation's hope, whom Georgians all
In silent longing seek,
If it be so, then happy he,
Whose fame will ever glow,
Whose puissant hand will be the first
To grasp that crib below!
If it be so, then happy she,
The mother blest, sublime,
Whose hallowed breast will be the first
To feed that babe divine!

  Deep down in Bazalethi's lake,
'Tis said a golden cradle lies,
And there beneath the welling waves,
An orchard blooms, and never dies.
That garden gay is always green,
Its blossoms never know decay;
The changing seasons of this earth,
That region rare need not obey.
Nor summer's sun, nor winter's cold,
Can harm that em'rald orchard gay
For, in those sunlit glades of gold,
Eternal spring doth hold her sway.
In that fair garden's very heart
The golden cradle aye doth rest,
There man hath never dared to go —
That spot has never known a guest



Translated by Marjory and Oliver Wardrops
Ganatleba Publishers
Tbilisi 1987