In Vilnius, in a construction site on Tartar Street,
a sunflower grew last year—
a flower of green, alien blood,
always turned to the sun,
last summer’s symbol—
I still hear its murmur in the wind,
I still see its golden ring of leaves,
dusty and bright,
a flower of green, alien blood,
as if sprouting from the Vilnius baroque,
it rocked its noble head up high
above the sleepy heat of scattered
bricks, above debris,
above foundations previously unseen,
above the medieval town
with my royal summer park
on top of breaking glass—O wind,
play another madrigal above the iron stubble,
an echo is audible from last year
in this waste land of heat, last summer’s penurious
flower changing its golden face again
to gaze through clouds of dust.
Sveta obitelj (2023)
#VlatkaVorkapić #NikolaĐuričko #SandraLončarić #DarkoMilas #JuditaFranković #DadoĆosić
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The Holy FamilyJahr: 2023 (Dezember)
Genre: Drama / Romantik
Regie: Vlatka Vorkapić
Hauptrollen: Nikola Đuričko, Sandra Lončarić, Darko Milas, Judita Franković, Dado Ćosić, Aleksandar Cvjetković, Anita Matić, Nataša Ivančević, Luna Pilić, Ivan Čuić …
Filmbeschreibung: In einem Dorf in Slawonien in den 1960er Jahren bietet der reiche Marko Janja an, seinen Sohn Ivo zu heiraten, was Janja als…
if the captain were to have his anthem, a song that describes him and represents him in a specific way, any anti-war song would work. but i think what does him justice in a respectful way is pete seeger’s “where have all the flowers gone?”. omitting the “girls” aspect in the lyrics (and if we change it to “boys” for the sake of the captain’s sexuality), the song’s words are tragically beautiful - it’s a lyrical circle going from the flowers being picked by lovers who are loved by men who are soldiers who died doing their military service whose graves are now adorned with flowers - and so on. it outlines the tragedy of army men whose bravery cost them their lives and whose loved ones are left to mourn despite their duty to continue living a vastly different, ordinary life.
however, as wonderfully melancholic as the original is, i had in mind a specific cover of the song - a czech cover. the music is a tad more complicated than the original; it uses an electric guitar, a bass, and drums. but it’s much more nuanced that way - the drums represent the rhythm of a military march. the bass playing root notes with perfect fifths is a symbol of simplicity and repetition (of first joining the army. as the bass modifies the melody with each rhyme in each verse, it also emphasises that the more time the cap spends in the military, the more difficult keeping to his old ways can get). and with each verse, a new element of music is added (keyboard, the guitar plays a slightly different melody etc. to emphasise that this cycle brings new tragedies but can’t be possibly changed as it is a lasting tradition.
and the lyrics. oh, those haunting lyrics. i’m not even gonna talk about the voice singing them because the dissection of its depressing reverb and the suddenly powerful delivery of “where have all the soldiers gone” would take weeks. i just wanna focus on the translation. not your typical non-english-song-turned-english where the song loses its meaning. the meaning is there, but like a hundred times stronger. the lines do repeat, but not from rhyme to rhyme. i’m gonna translate this specific section because it’s so captain coded:
Where have all the soldiers gone
Long time passing
Where have all the soldiers gone
A long, long time ago
Where have all the soldiers gone
Gone to graveyards, every one
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?
in czech, it’s like this (nearly word-for-word translation):
And where have all those soldiers gone
People, what ever happened here?
And where have all those soldiers gone
Where could they be?
Series of graves in a line
The wind is howling all around
Who will ever understand?
Who will ever understand?
i see a major difference between the last four lines. the original shows complete silence after a battle, how everyone fighting there died, and everything’s gone until another battle breaks in that exact spot. the czech version relays those emotions in a different way; yes, it’s dead silent, but the howling of the wind is a sign of something after death, of mourning coming both from the lovers and the dead, i.e. havers and the captain. and the “who will ever understand?” is somehow a contrast. “when will they ever learn?” to me is clearer because it either talks about the soldiers not learning they shouldn’t go to war or something along those lines. the former can say “who will ever understand [why those soldiers died]?” or “who will ever understand [the howling wind]?” and so on. it’s those endless questions the captain might ask himself from time to time to nobody’s understanding, i feel. when will he ever understand his death, or his love for havers, or his position?
here’s the song in question; i absolutely recommend just because of its heartbreaking atmosphere
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A day like this one, early
they'd conjure from clouds, in ancient times,
a day like this, early
that's full of returning birds
again I pour
my voice into sacred song,
and just as in childhood, again
I am summer swan, rainbow bridge,
the flapping bare feet
on a run down the pavement,
fear of death the breeze
clears, early like this
a day the ancestors conjured from clouds.