Papuzsa: Bloody tears (What the Germans did to us in Volhynia in 43 and 44)
Ah, you dear people!
I don’t like to talk about terrible times,
My soul is sick,
She is close to cry.
But what should I do? I have to sing
even for those bad people who find pleasure in war.
Everyone shall hear it.
never let it happen again, God
That anyone has to experience war,
this immeasurable tragedy and these bloody tears,
Who had to go through with a tormented soul
The Jewish child
and with the Romani children, the Romni .
Oh, my song, my mourning song,
Like a country that has never seen the sun.
It hurts so much to be in a world of war
Our bodies are constantly trembling
and the soul cries tears of blood,
Nobody knows where their own people are.
* * *
In the forest without water, without fire – a great famine.
Where should the children sleep? There is no tent.
Night and day – impossible to light a fire,
at night it would reveal us to the Germans;
During the day it would be the smoke.
How should we live with children in the deep winter?
All barefoot,
Left in the city of Włodzimierz.
When the Germans wanted to kill us,
they first gave us exhausting work.
A German came rushing to the Roma one day:
“I’m going to tell you something terrible.
This night they want to kill you,
don’t tell anyone
because I am Roma, too,
A true Roma!
May God bring you good luck
In the darkness of the forest.”
He spoke these words
and embraced everyone.
I went deep into the forest,
for a long time i ran crying!
The Roma group gathered,
A hundred people all together.
Before dawn we went into the great forest,
we left everything behind,
Neither carriages nor horses remained.
A small child on his back, another one on his arm,
So the Roma went.
What should we do here?
The Germans are not far away, they can arrest us.
Suddenly – no one knows where,
A group of partisans appears and opens fire.
At the sight of children and women they understood!
A brutal fight begins.
The Tschapayev group knows no fear!
You are talking to the Roma, what has happened?
“The Germans wanted to kill us,
We had to hide in the forest.”
“You poor, so many, whole hundred!”
How are we supposed to live here?
What to eat, what to drink, how to find money?
There are two poor Jews with us,
Their people were all killed.
The Roma mourned these cruelties in their beautiful songs,
The birds carried them far into the forest,
they carried on telling one to the other.
That night was beautiful,
The stars were asleep in the sky
And with them in the forest the Roma.
The birds and children woke them up.
A clear stream murmurs in the dawning day,
He hums his lovely song.
The Roma Children Catching Fish,
Cheerful, they chat quietly over the water
And forget about their sorrow.
They do not suspect, dear God, what is awaiting them.
God alone can know!
Oh, my song, my mourning song!
No one knows, my God, no one knows,
what is bothering our souls!
Twelve of our people,
Twelve murdered by the Germans.
* * *
They are chasing us,
But the forest is deep, they fear it and turn back.
They surround the wood,
They are fighting against the partisans.
The women cry, they plead with God,
Everyone goes to steal at night, but often returns empty-handed.
Two days, three days without food,
everyone goes to sleep with a nagging hunger.
They can’t close their eyes all night long.
They stare at the stars.
Have mercy on my God, life is beautiful!
But the Germans do not let us live!
They beat us, they beat us,
In the distance, the shots are popping like my songs.
Oh, my little star!
Early in the morning you shine
bright over the world.
Go ahead, blind the eyes of the Germans!
Free the streets from their cruelty!
Don’t show them the way!
Give them a wrong one,
So that the Jewish and Roman children can live!
Forest, forest, oh my forest,
So far you are and full of leaves!
And you humans, what do you mean?
Where shall we live, where shall we survive by a hundred?
There was despair but also beautiful moments,
When the weather got warmer,
A little sun, a few tears.
We can collect a few blackberries,
Drink tea from wild herbs,
Enjoy porcini mushrooms, a little fish,
sometimes also cooking dead horse,
Decaying for two weeks, or three – precious meat.
Potatoes are cooked to marzipan of the Roma,
Ten, sometimes twenty a week
The Roma brought along.
But when the merciless winter comes,
What should the Romni do with their children?
What should she dress the little ones with?
All the clothes are worn, worn, the bodies bare,
death appears more gentle.
Heaven alone could tell of our uncertain fate,
And the brook alone is a witness of the many tears.
What evil eye cursed us?
Which lips have damned us?
Dear God, do not listen to them!
Answer us instead!
The night turns icy.
The old women begin to sing
From an old romani story.
The winter comes embroidered with gold,
Snow falls on the earth, on our hands,
Like tiny stars.
The black eyes freeze,
The little souls die.
On that day, a partisan from the Tschapayev group told us,
We need to cross the tracks.
Another night, it’s true, we didn’t sleep.
Thick snow has fallen,
he covered everything.
Only the Milky Way was visible, high up there.
They run, they buzz a song.
A fierce firefight erupts nearby.
Everyone throws themselves on the floor, covers the children’s mouths,
all frozen in terror, in mortal fear death.
On that icy night
a little girl died,
And four days later
The women buried four children
In a grave of snow.
Four at a time
Buried the same day!
Look, oh sun, like without you
The Romani child freezes to death
In the endless forest!
The bird hears the complaints of the parents,
the creek hears them and the forest is sobbing a song of mourning
And carries it far beyond the borders.
Why is the forest crying?
Because the Romni is crying.
More than one bullet touched her and her people’s heads,
Like blind birds,
More than a bloody tear was shed, in vain…
But the Romni no longer goes to the village,
Every week she finds some food –
A carcass in a wood, dead horse,
And a little salt or forgotten wheat grains.
Or a forest plant
Or a hedgehog, this piglet of the bushes.
***
From the night the sun rose,
The forest shone in white splendor,
I’d rather return to the forest,
And that the wolves may tear me apart,
As rotting in these houses.
In the fresh blood there are people here and there,
Like in wells.
Once the moon appeared in my window,
i can’t sleep. Someone looks at me from outside.
I ask: “Who’s there?”
“Open the door, my dear little Romni!”
I look, it’s a lovely little Jew.
She trembles, she shakes,
She needs food.
“My poor Jew, what misfortune is happening to you!”
I give her bread, what I have, a shirt.
We both forgot,
That the Nazis kept watch near us.
But that night they didn’t come to us.
“My dear Romni!
Let me kiss you for your kindness!
You’re afraid and I’m afraid.
Every week I will come, in the dark.
You don’t know where the partisans are?”
“We marched with them.
But they went on,
when we went to sleep.”
* * *
I got sick and after me all my people,
Thank God, no one died.
Six long weeks all lay in bed,
Boiled blackberry sprigs have healed us.
And God gave us a warm spring.
Snowspots here and there.
The Gadje come under our windows,
They look from a distance, they ask:
“Who are these Roma?” and cross each other.
But little by little the Roma forget,
They call each other with their Polish names:
Janek, Bronia, Krzysia, Zosia…
But they don’t understand my name –
My blessed romano name.
But the Gadje really enjoyed it,
Kill all Roma.
They let them dig graves,
they wanted to kill us.
How many tears have been shed!
But the Gadje did not let themselves be softened.
Our men, our women, are sick
On the ground in broad daylight.
There was murder, night after night.
The Roma fall to their knees, they plead with God,
They cry tears of blood
Oh, how much better we were in the forest,
As with these gadje that ruin our bodies!
But we’re not afraid, fight with the axe in our hands!
Shall they come to kill us,
And next, the children.
* * *
The darkness was clearing.
Another Romni and me –
Her soul rests in peace
To God,
for the poor is no longer of this world,
We got up in the dark, we left,
But our souls were black in fear,
As dark as this night, so heavy and impenetrable.
We quickly took the path,
Which the Chapayev partisans had taken.
Oh, you dark night!
And you song, my song!
All the birds
Praying to God for our children,
That the evil serpents and the gadje spare them.
Hey, misfortune of our people!
Hey you, my unfortunate destiny!
“Listen to me, my love, we have to go back,
we musn’t lose each other, the two of us, away from each other.
It’s better, we’re all together,
if we unite, everything will be better.”
Hey you, my path,
Show us a soldier with heart,
who reaches out his hand to us!
We all sang this song together,
The Tschapayev fighters and all the Roma,
All gave hands to each other
Where the paths cross,
and they all went wherever their gaze took them.
* * *
We came across Polish soldiers,
We stayed there for two weeks.
The soldiers were dressed like the Germans,
Except our eagle on their caps.
The snow fell in thick heavy flakes and blocked our way.
A snow so dense that it swallowed the wheels.
We had to clear our way with our feet
And then push the wagons behind the horses.
How much misery and hunger!
How many torments and paths!
How many pointed stones have hurt our feet!
How many, many bullets were whistling around our ears!
May all Roma come to me,
as to a forest in which a great fire blazes,
And that shines in the sunlight.
That to the call of my song
All Roma gather
And hear my message.
* * *
Give us, dear God, a nice warm season,
That my torn tent finally dries.
A fine rain drizzled,
Who drenched the children.
He carried my song away in the fog
To all the rich Roma,
who have new tents.
They do not understand who is truly rich:
Those who live in abundance, or those who
who have both reason and white bread in their hands.
As the forest sings, so the Roma dance,
Light as a feather, heavy as a stone,
they are inflamed with love,
Like a living flame.
It is now up to us to live in houses,
To sing our most beautiful song,
Read and tell books.
It is our turn, dear people,
To add our own story to this new world.
Papùśa (Bronislawa Wajs) (2011): Larmes de sang / Ratvale jasva. In: Routes d’antan / Xargatune Droma. L’Harmattan, Paris. PP. 66-81.
Translation into German by Inga Frohn with the cooperation of Elsa Fernandez
Note to Translation:
This translation into German is based on the French translation by Marcel Courthiade published in 2010, taking into account the original version in Romanes.
The use of the adjectives ›romano‹ (male), ›romani‹ (female and neutral), ›romane‹ (plural), borrowed from the novel, was taken from fragments on survival (Fernandez 2020).