Long Budapest Poems

Postcard 1
by Miklós Radnóti
written August 30, 1944
translated by Michael R. Burch
 
Out of Bulgaria, the great wild roar of the artillery thunders,
resounds on the mountain ridges, rebounds, then ebbs into silence
while here men, beasts, wagons...

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Letter to My Wife
by Miklos Radnoti
translated by Michael R. Burch

A poem written during the Holocaust in Lager Heidenau, in the mountains above Zagubica, August-September, 1944

Deep down in the darkness hell awaits--silent, mute.
Silence screams in my...

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Beautiful land, hematite-like mountains, six dimension space, lightning-colored light
Deep world, high world, deep land, and magnificent highlands, mirror-shine ground
A transparent world, everything is like a  crystal, and inside is an infinite world of mirrors
I...

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I once rode a hurricane 
from Trinidad to Budapest.
Almost drowned five times
grabbing onto driftwood that floated by to stay alive.
Prayed and prayed for a ship to passby.
Finally landed in a place of many temples 
A monk had given...

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Life in Budapest

Life in Budapest is unforgettable years’ moments
It happened so many years ago, time is older
Just my memory is lively, past is younger

Yes, I live in the present past, it’s retro life
  ...

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The phone rang it was Alfred, the man most likely to be my father if he confessed the relationship he had with 
Olga, the dancer from Budapest.
It was important to me to find a real...

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What can be fairer and just then, 
the beauty of your plush pink skin.
In the moonlight, your beauty glimers in pink 
as does the moon, 
over the tripping waves of the peaceful sea.
In sunlight, the...

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Lighted Chain Bridge glints, enlivens, sparkles
Holding in view magnificent Matthias Church
And hillsides of Budapest in distinctive posture
Enchanted by milieu of ambiance on visions
In cultural rejuvenation of palaces and castles
Illuminating echoes of eclectic architecture
Gracing river banks...

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Ending moonshine      

We shall linger in the silence of the darkest of 
nights                 ...

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Jan caught a jet plane to New York
Where bacon does not come from pork
To end her trip
Jan let one rip
The Captain delivered a stork

Jan's flight was Economy grade
Stuck between an old man and old maid
In...

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8/12/16


Can't reverse any clock or the hands of time
Once in a blue moon, stars or planets align

Doing my best to be a stand-up guy
I'd be damned to lie

I'd rather take a chance and climb
Among so...

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Regarding fashion,Punk set out to gauge
The style of hair and clothes which would outrage.
John Lennon's voice was silenced at this time;
Mark Chapman was convicted for the crime.

A technical development unfurled
Which launched the first PC into...

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Wanderlust.

When I was young, and just a girl
I wanted to travel around the world -
Casablanca, Marrakesh,
Rio de Janeiro and Budapest.
The more exotic the sound of the name,
the more I was drawn, like a moth to...

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In the valleys and 
the hills
There is a 
beautiful 
country,
Fairy nature here 
beams-
Walking through 
Hungary.
Mineral waters-
this is Hungary,
Wines of gods-
this 
is Hungary,
Curches domes-
this is Hungary,
Rivers flow-this is 
Hungary.
Caves of million 
wonders,
Sparkling with 
silver lights,
Thousands of...

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Here is the time of new growth and life
as was in Prague and Budapest
So too in Cairo, Tripoli, Damascus
reform is not bloodless or taken in jest

Reform (n) Amendment of what is defective, 
vicious, corrupt, or...

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In your loss
the blazing sun is paprika red
the sky turns pale blue in sadness
the Danube is flowing calm
absorbing anger of that bursting sun
Standing next to the wooden cascade
I sense an aura of your essence
You travelled...

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In 1944 or so,
The Nazis did deliver
A group of Jews in Hungary
Into the Danube River.

They lined them up and shot them dead -
Not one did soldiers save -
A Jew was not considered worthy
Of a normal...

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