Terjemah Journey of the Magi – TS Eliot

Journey of the Magi
by TS Eliot

“A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.”
And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
And running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly
And the villages dirty and charging high prices:
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arriving at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.

(Diterjemahkan oleh Shiny.ane el’poesya)

Journey of the Magi

“Kami mengalami demam,
Masa terburuk tahun ini
Untuk sebuah perjalanan, dan perjalanan yang begitu panjang:
Jalan yang dalam dan cuaca yang tajam,
Musim dingin yang sangat beku.”
Dan unta-unta itu sakit perut, sakit kaki, kebal api,
Berbaring di salju yang mencair.
Ada saat-saat yang kita kenang
Istana musim panas di lereng, teras,
Dan gadis-gadis sutra membawa serbat.
Kemudian para pria unta mengutuk dan menggerutu
Dan melarikan diri, dan menginginkan minuman keras dan wanita mereka,
Dan malam yang hangat padam, dan kurangnya tempat berteduh,
Dan kota-kota bermusuhan, dan kota-kota tidak ramah
Dan desa-desa kotor dan membebankan harga tinggi:
Kami memiliki masa yang sulit.
Pada akhirnya kami lebih suka bepergian sepanjang malam,
Tidur terlelap,
Dengan suara-suara yang bernyanyi di telinga kita, mengatakan
Bahwa ini semua adalah kebodohan.

Kemudian saat fajar kami turun ke lembah beriklim sedang,
Basah, di bawah garis salju, berbau tumbuh-tumbuhan;
Dengan aliran dan kincir air yang mengalahkan kegelapan,
Dan tiga pohon di langit rendah,
Dan seekor kuda putih tua berlari kencang di padang rumput.
Kemudian kami sampai di sebuah kedai dengan daun anggur di atas ambang pintu,
Enam tangan di pintu terbuka yang sedang mencari kepingan perak,
Dan kaki menendang kulit anggur yang kosong.
Tapi tidak ada informasi, jadi kami melanjutkan
Dan tiba di malam hari, tidak terlalu cepat
Menemukan tempat; itu (bisa dibilang) memuaskan.

Semua ini sudah lama sekali, aku ingat,
Dan aku akan melakukannya lagi, tetapi tetaplah
Ini ditetapkan
Ini: apakah kita dipimpin sejauh itu?
Kelahiran atau Kematian? Ada kelahiran, tentu saja,
Kami punya bukti dan tidak diragukan lagi. Aku telah melihat kelahiran dan kematian,
Tapi mengira mereka berbeda; Kelahiran ini adalah
Penderitaan yang keras dan pahit bagi kita, seperti Kematian, kematian kita.
Kami kembali ke tempat kami, Kerajaan ini,
Tapi tidak lagi nyaman di sini, di keringanan lama,
Dengan orang asing mencengkeram dewa-dewa mereka.
Aku seharusnya senang dengan kematian yang lain.

Thomas Stearns Eliot (26 September 1888 – 4 January 1965) was a poet, essayist, publisher, playwright, literary critic and editor. Considered one of the 20th century’s major poets, he is a central figure in English-language Modernist poetry.

Born in St. Louis, Missouri, to a prominent Boston Brahmin family, he moved to England in 1914 at the age of 25 and went on to settle, work, and marry there. He became a British citizen in 1927 at the age of 39, subsequently renouncing his American citizenship.

Eliot first attracted widespread attention for his poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” in 1915, which was received as a modernist masterpiece. It was followed by some of the best-known poems in the English language, including “The Waste Land” (1922), “The Hollow Men” (1925), “Ash Wednesday” (1930), and Four Quartets (1943). He was also known for his seven plays, particularly Murder in the Cathedral (1935) and The Cocktail Party (1949). He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948, “for his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry”.