Leci liście z drzewa
Co wyrosło wolne;
Znad mogiły śpiewa
Jakieś ptaszę polne
Nie było, nie było
Polsko dobrze tobie!
Wszystko się przyśniło
A twe dzieci w grobie
Popalone sioła
Rozwalone miasta
A w polu dokoła
Zawodzi niewiasta
Wszyscy poszli z domu
Wzięli z sobą kosy;
Robić nie ma komu
W polu giną kłosy
Kiedy pod Warszawą
Dziatwa się zbierała
Zdało się, że z sławą
Wyjdzie Polska cała
Bili zimę całą
Bili się przez lato;
Lecz w jesieni za to
I dziatwy nie stało
Skończyły się boje
Ale pusta praca
Bo w zagony swoje
Nikt z braci nie wraca
Jednych ziemia gniecie
A inni w niewoli
A inni po świecie
Bez chaty i roli
Ni pomocy z nieba
Ani z ludzkiej ręki
Pusta leży gleba
Darmo kwitną wdzięki
Leci liście z drzewa
Znów leci z drzewa
O! Polska kraino!
Gdyby ci rodacy
Co za ciebie giną
Wzięli się do pracy
I po garstce ziemi
Z Ojczyzny zabrali
Już by dłońmi swymi
Polskę usypali
Lecz wybić się siłą
To dla nas już dziwy;
Bo zdrajców przybyło
A lud zbyt poczciwy
ENGLISH TRANSLATION:
Leaves fall from a tree
That grew up freely!
On the graves sing
Some birds of the fields.
It didn't happen, it didn't,
O Poland, well spent for you.
Everything, everything was just a dream
And your children are in the grave.
Your villages have burned down
Your cities have been destroyed,
And all around in the fields
Women lament.
Everyone left their houses,
They took their scythes with them,
There is no one left,
In the fields the crops are dying.
When in Warsaw
The youth have gathered,
It seemed like fame
Would come out of all of Poland.
All winter they held out,
During the summer they ruled,
But in the fall they weakened
And the youngest did not arrive.
The battles are over,
But it was in vain
Because in their plots
None of our brothers returned.
Some are piled up in the earth
Others are in captivity,
The rest are scattered around the world
Homeless and hungry.
There is no help from heaven,
Nor human hands,
The ground is devastated,
The charms of blossoms show themselves in vain.
The leaves fall from a tree,
They fall once again.
Oh! land of Poland, if your compatriots
Who die for you worked
And those who from their homeland take away a handful of soil
Already with their own hands they could have rebuilt Poland.
But to stand out by force
Is now a wonder to us,
Because the traitors have arrived,
And the people are too nice.
Credits
Song: Polish classical music
Composer: Frederic Chopin
Singer: Stefania Toczynska
Music video: Courtesy of Stefania Toczynska
Text: fjgajewski.webs.com
Translation: Wikipedia / H.M.
Hosted by: Droomwevers World of Music - www.droomwevers.nl
Copyright: Fair use principle, for educational purposes.
*Also known as: ´Spiew z mogily´ (Hymn from the grave)
Soon after it was written in the early 1930s, Chopin’s ´Spiew z mogily´ (Hymn from the grave) became a national property, emblematic for Poles of their historic quest
for freedom. The poem passed into oral tradition and was sung to an
anonymous popular tune.
In his setting of this text, Chopin used to good efiect a number of pictorial devices. His ´Spiew z mogily´ is clearly a stylized march: except for opening and closing measures, it is either in duple meter or common time, and dotted rhythms are present. At a climaitic moment, measufe 48, the words ‘z sławą’ are underscored with repeated notes in the rhythmis drum-pattern march.The prevailing minor mode and the slow tempi of the piece, together with the mournful text, (more or less) funeral march. At the beginning and end of, tolling bells are represented by low repealed chords sounding, and the chords and tonic octaves later provide this same imagery. Chopin's minor key with many flats would have been, according to early nineteeth-century convention, somber, gloomy, suited to themes of night and death.
