Percy Bysshe Shelley. Vertaling in Afrikaans.

 

Versindaba kompetisie vir vertaalde gedigte (33)

 

Percy Bysshe Shelley. Vertaling van Engels in Afrikaans. Vert. deur Ollie Olwagen.

 

 Osteologika

(Met apologie aan Percy Bysshe Shelley)

 

Ek vind ’n swerfling van die rou Gariep

Wat sê: Twee vaal verweerde vere dop

Omhoog uit sand langs die rivier so diep.

Daar naby krap ’n lunsriem aan sy kop

Verwagtend, maar meer dom as dominant

Van frons en lip, asof jy in sy oë kan lees

Van al die merries wat gestempelmerk

Sou neerslag vind in sy verwarde gees.

En uit sy mond sou hierdie woorde skal:

“My naam is Dog en vere plant my werk,

Want hoenders wil ek kweek en dis maar Al.”

Niks verder meer. Die somber plek.

En by die vent wei luiters langs die wal

’n kaal kapokkie wat sê “kôk” en “kêk”.

 

***

 

 Ozymandias

Percy Bysshe Shelley

 

I met a traveller from an antique land

Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,

Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,

And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:

And on the pedestal these words appear:

“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:

Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away.

 

Bronverwysing:

Shelley, Percy Bysshe. 1818. Ozymandias. Published in 1818 in the 11 January issue of The Examiner in London.