Stripy fields

July 6 is celebrated in Finland as the Day of Eino Leino, and the Day of Poetry and Summer. One of the best known poem in Finnish is Eino Leino's Nocturne:

I hear the evening corncrake calling.
Moonlight flood the fields of tasseled grain.
Wood smoke, drifting veils the distant valleys.
Summer evening's joy is here for me.
I'm not happy yet no sorrow shakes me,
but the dark woods stillness I would welcome.
Rosy clouds through which the day is falling,
sleepy breezes from the blue gray mountains,
shodows on the water, meadow flowers...
out of these my heart's own song I'll make!
I will sing it, summer hay-sweet maiden,
sing to you my deep serenity,
my own faith that sounds a swelling music,
oak-leaf garland ever fresh and green.
I'll no longer chase the will-o-wisp.
Happiness is here in my own keeping.
Day by day, life's circle narrows, closes.
Time stands still now ... weather cocks all sleeping.
Here before me lies a shadowy way
leading to a strange, an unknown place.

(Origin NOCTURNE by Finnish National Poet Eino Leino. Translated by Aina Swan Cutler)


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