View Single Post
Old 07-06-2020, 01:58 PM   #17
Huinesoron
Overshadowed Eagle
 
Huinesoron's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2017
Location: The north-west of the Old World, east of the Sea
Posts: 3,778
Huinesoron is battling Black Riders on Weathertop.Huinesoron is battling Black Riders on Weathertop.
Yeah, it's really not easy. I've hacked together the next verse, but have had to take a few more liberties with the source.

(I've also revised a couple of lines in verse 1)

In the hour when slumber calls
And the cloak of Night dulls the air
I don’t see these stone-carven walls
For I know that you are still there.
I know I can never return
That my heart lies cold by the way
There is no escaping my fate
In this land where memories burn

I cannot bring myself to curse your choice
I cannot curse my own unchanging nature
Your love sings to my heart, a whispered voice
The time for turning from the truth is over.
The Grinding Ice burns crimson in the sun
A boundary of blood to keep us parted
My sorrow’s not that I go on alone
My sorrow’s that our song was left unfinished…

Between us now, time and Sea fled
Between us now, shadowy road
In the dark you cried to me: "No"
Leaving me alone with my "Yes".
Now you are my hope in the night
Now you are eternal remorse
Had I not marched headlong to war
We would stand together, united.

Your wings blaze like an Eagle in the West
Oh, would that love had never heard of rules!
It wasn't you who left me in the dust
Forever I regret the Night I left you!
Perhaps there is no boundary between
Perhaps our summer Sun is undiminished
My sorrow's not that I cannot return
My sorrow’s that our song was left unfinished…


I've shifted the implication of the wings line from '??angel' to 'Eagle', because Tolkien. ^_^

I think you might be onto something with swapping those two stanzas around. Let me see:

You are now my ev'ry success
You are my rebuke where I go
In that Night you cried to me "No!"
Leaving me alone with my "Yes".

Between us flows an Ocean of Time
Between us flows a shadowy road
Had I not pursued that old foe
Perhaps another fate would be mine


That's certainly more faithful to the original, despite the shuffle. I shall have to ponder. (Who would have thought "Yes" would be the difficult one to rhyme?)

Any comments on the translation are always welcome.

hS
Huinesoron is offline   Reply With Quote