Le Morte D'Arthur by Amelia Josephine Burr (1916)

Dealing with Malory's Le Morte D'Arthur, I would like to show you a poem based on the topic I am tackling. On the other hand, I have made a translation of the poem into Spanish for those of you who are interested and for me to practice. I've tried to do my best in order to make a correct translation, sorry if something do not seem appropriate or if you find nonsensical parts.

LE MORTE D'ARTHUR

by

AMELIA JOSEPHINE BURR

Some men say in many parts of England that King Arthur is not dead . . . rather will I say: Here in this world he changed his life. —MALORY.

HE passed in mystery from mortal sight

Upon the waters that enshrined his sword.

There was no man whose eyes had seen the blight

Of death upon the face of Britain's lord,

And all of Arthur that was left his land

Was a great memory like an armoured ghost,

That steeled the sinews of the English hand

And thundered in the waves of England's coast.

 

Time made of Arthur and of Avalon

A poet's dream to please an idle hour,

While England through triumphant years went on

Proud in great riches, confident in power,

Girding the world with her imperial sway—

Too busy and too prosperous to see

The eastward threatening of a certain Day

That should make different all the days to be.

Before its dawn there came a man, whose eyes

Were strange alike to pity and to fear—

Not cruel, but unsparing, in the wise

Of those who see eternity too near.

Upon this quiet doer of his deed

Flamed the red morning of a world in dust.

"Trust him!" cried England in her final need,

And royally he rose to meet her trust.

Out of the stubborn stuff of youth untaught

He shaped an army to his high desire.

Unhastening, unfaltering, he wrought

Amid the rising tide of blood and fire

A living shield for England's labouring heart—

The breaking heart is too great to fail!

And then—as if time's curtains drew apart

To welcome back a kingly ghost in mail—

He passed in mystery from mortal sight.
The waters took him, as it was of old.
The tale of how death came to England's knight
Never by any moral may be told.
All we have left of Kitchener lives on,
Steel sinewed in the army that he made.
There may be joy to-day in Avalon
For the home-coming of a hero's shade.

(Algunos hombres dicen en muchas partes de Inglaterra que el Rey Arturo no está muerto… yo diría más: aquí en este mundo él cambió su vida.) —MALORY

ÉL pasó envuelto en misterio a la vista de los mortales

Sobre las aguas que su espada consagró.

No hubo hombre cuyos ojos hubieran visto la sombra

De la muerte sobre la cara del señor de Gran Bretaña,

Y todo lo que quedó de Arturo en su tierra

Fue un gran recuerdo como un fantasma con armadura,

Que armó de valor los tendones de la mano inglesa

Y bramó en las olas de la costa de Inglaterra.

El tiempo hizo de Arturo y de Avalon1

El sueño de un poeta para complacer una hora ociosa,

Mientras que Inglaterra a través de años clamorosos prosiguió

Orgullosa entre grandes riquezas, segura de su poder,

Rodeando el mundo con su dominio imperial—

Demasiado ocupada y próspera para ver

La amenaza proveniente del este que cierto día

Debería hacer de los días venideros algo diferente.

Antes de su albor vino un hombre, cuyos ojos

Eran extraños similares a la compasión y el miedo—

No era cruel, sino implacable, en la manera

De aquellos que veían demasiado cerca la eternidad.

Sobre este tranquilo hacedor de sus hazañas

Refulgió la mañana roja de un mundo convertido en polvo.

“¡Confiar en él!” gritó Inglaterra en su última necesidad,

Y soberanamente se erigió para enfrentarse con su responsabilidad

De todos aquellos jóvenes testarudos sin instruir

Creó un ejército de acuerdo a su gran deseo.

Sin apresurarse, inquebrantable, trajo

De entre la creciente marea de sangre y fuego

Un escudo vivo para el corazón luchador de Inglaterra—

¡El corazón roto es demasiado grande para malograrse!

Y entonces—como si los halos del tiempo se apartasen

Para dar de nuevo la bienvenida de un majestuoso fantasma con cota de malla—

Pasó envuelto en misterio a la vista de los mortales.

Las aguas se lo llevaron, como si fuera por vejez.

El relato de cómo la muerte le vino al caballero de Inglaterra

Nunca podría ser contada por ningún mortal.

Todo lo que nos ha quedado de Kitchener2 perdura

Fortaleza en el ejército que creó.

Hasta hoy puede que haya alegría en Avalon

Por el regreso a casa de la sombra de un héroe.

1Horatio Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener of Khartoum. 1850--1916, British field marshal. As head of the Egyptian army (1892--98), he expelled the Mahdi from the Sudan (1898), occupying Khartoum; he also commanded British forces (1900--02) in the Boer War and (1902--09) in India. He conducted the mobilization of the British army for World War I as war minister (1914--16); he was drowned on his way to Russia.

2Avalon (probably from the Welsh word afal, meaning apple; see Etymology below) is a legendary island featured in the Arthurian legend, famous for its beautiful apples. It first appears in Geoffrey of Monmouth's 1136 pseudohistorical account Historia Regum Britanniae ("The History of the Kings of Britain") as the place where King Arthur's sword Excalibur (Caliburnus) was forged and later where Arthur was taken to recover from his wounds after the Battle of Camlann. Avalon was associated from an early date with immortal beings such as Morgan le Fay.

Sources:

• http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/AUTHMENU.htm
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

Translated by: Javier Martín Mayor