From Among Hundreds of Masts -- Mihail Eminescu

Guest poem submitted by Mihail Faina :

(Poem #381) From Among Hundreds of Masts From among hundreds of masts Leaving shores and banks and bays, Are there many to be lost Broken by the winds and waves? From among birds of passage, Flying over lands and seas, Are there many to be drowned By the waves and by the sea? If you chase away your luck Or ideals, all you have, You are followed everywhere By the winds and by the waves. Undeciphered is the thought That keeps passing through your chants As they fly, they murmur it All these winds and all these waves. -- Mihail Eminescu

Translation by Gabriela Bernea.

This particular poem has been with me since my teenager years; its
particular message about the sea as a connection with the infinite and
the human desire to know what is behind the horizon despite any risks
makes me recite this poem whenever I feel blue. It does sound better in
Romanian though (just hope that the English translation is good enough
to express all this).

Mihail.

About the poet:

MIHAIL EMINESCU (b. January 15, 1850 in Botosani- d. June 15, 1889 in
Bucharest, Romania) (his real name was M. Eminovici - pron.: Eminovitch)
is regarded as the national poet of Romania. Born in Botosani, (pron.:
Botoshan), Moldova he died at the age of 38 years in Bukarest, suffering
from paralysis the last five years of his life. From 1869 to 1874 he
studied philosophy in Vienna and Berlin. Only a small part of his work
was published during
his lifetime ("Poezii(Poems)" 1883).

Eminencu raised not only poetry, whose best representative he was to
become, but also Romanian literary prose, literary and political
journalism to the highest levels of modern European thinking and
feeling. He is most loved for his pieces dealing with nature, and love,
and for his "lyric of thoughts ", deeply melancholy and full of
"Weltschmerz/Poesie Noire/Metaphysical distress" and longing for death.
His intact lyric  has a very proper and touching melody.  His work was
influenced by German philosophers and poets (Schopenhauer in
particular). He translated several works of German poets like Friedrich
Schiller into  Romanian.

Here it is a link for more info about Eminescu:
[broken link] http://lcjdap.soroscj.ro/projects/iearn/discovering_Eminescu/englcntr.html