L Ő NNROT, Elias

Kalevala

…..
Once to swim I sought the sea-side,

There to sport among the billows;

With the stone of many colors

Sank poor Aino to the bottom

Of the deep and boundless blue-sea,

Like a pretty son-bird, perished.

Never come a-fishing, father,

To the borders of these waters,

Never during all thy life-time,

As thou lovest daughter Aino.

Mother dear, I sought the sea-side,

There to sport among the billows;

With the stone of many colors,

Sank poor Aino to the bottom

Of the deep and boundless blue-sea,

Like a pretty song-bird perished.

Never mix thy bread, dear mother,

With the blue-sea's foam and waters,

Never during all thy life-time,

As thou lovest daughter Aino.

Brother dear, I sought the sea-side,

There to sport among the billows;

With the stone of many colors

Sank poor Aino to the bottom

Of the deep and boundless blue-sea,

Like a pretty song-bird perished.

Never bring thy prancing war-horse,

Never bring thy royal racer,

Never bring thy steeds to water,

To the borders of the blue-sea,

Never during all thy life-time,

As thou lovest sister Aino.

Sister dear, I sought the sea-side,

There to sport among the billows;

With the stone of many colors

Sank poor Aino to the bottom

Of the deep and boundless blue-sea,

Like a pretty song-bird perished.

Never come to lave thine eyelids

In this rolling wave and sea-foam,

Never during all thy life-time,

As thou lovest sister Aino.

All the waters in the blue-sea

Shall be blood of Aino's body;

All the fish that swim these waters

Shall be Aino's flesh forever;

All the willows on the sea-side

Shall be Aino's ribs hereafter;

All the sea-grass on the margin

Will have grown from Aino's tresses.”

…..
Words shall not be hid

nor spells buried

might shall not sink underground

though the mighty go.

…..
“For this I weep all my days

and throughout my lifetime grieve

that I swam from my own lands

and came from familiar lands

towards these strange doors

to these foreign gates.”

…..
Craftsman Ilmarinen wept

Every evening for his woman,

Weeping sleepless through the nights

And fasting through the days;

In the early hours complaining,

Every morning sighing for her,

Lamenting for his lovely lost one,

For his dear one in the grave.

For a month he swung no hammer,

Did not touch the copper handle,

and the clinking forge was silent.

…..
Said the craftsman Ilmarinen:

"I poor fellow, do not know

How to live or how survive;

Sitting up or lying down

Nights are long and time is tedious.

I am troubled, low in spirit.

…..
Lonely are the nights now, lonely

And the mornings dreary, dreary.

In my sleeping I am troubled,

But the waking is the saddest.

It's not for evening that I'm lonely,

Not for morning that I'm dreary,

Not for olden times lamenting,

But I'm lonely for my loved one,

Dreary for the missing of her,

Lamenting for my dark-browed lovely.

Often in these days it happens,

Happens in my midnight dreaming

that I stretch my hand out touching,

touching something that is nothing

…..