BIOGRAPHY AND POEMS
Compiled by Shant Norashkharian
* Some of the following biographical information and poems are from BEDROS TOURIAN: WORKS, published by the Catholicossate of Cilicia, Antelias, Lebanon, 1987. *
"Ah, one must take life as it is. If he had fallen here, therefore there was a reason, there was a meaning, a power, which was escaping from his consciousness, but yet it was essential for him to realize his destiny." This is what Gosdan Zarian wrote once about an Armenian orphan who had lived through the Genocide. Bedros Tourian also had to face a tragic destiny which he could not understand, and had to explain or justify, if the universe and life after death were to have any meaning or purpose.
Bedros Tourian had shown the unmistakable mark of genius as a poet at an early age. But like two other great Armenian poets, Misak Metzarents (1886-1908) and Mateos Zarifian (1894-1924), his life was cut short by tuberculosis, an incurable disease during their time, and he finally died at the age of 20. Born in 1851, at the age of six he was sent to Skudar's (Istanbul) Armenian school, where he started writing his poems and plays and making translations from French literature. From 1868-1869 he taught Armenian, wrote in the local papers, and acted in plays, all the time surviving on very little money. After falling sick, he continued writing while being secluded at his home. His correspondence with his friends contain some revealing pages about his thoughts and feelings. He died on the evening of January 20, 1872.
Beside the volume of his poems called "SONGS", Tourian is the author of several plays, translations, and some prose.
COMPLAINT
(DRDOUNCHK)
By Bedros Tourian (1851-1872)
* Translated from Armenian by Shant Norashkharian *
Oh, farewell to you, farewell God and sun
Who are glittering high above my soul...!
I also now go as another star to add to the sky,
Yet what are the stars but mournful curses
For immaculate and miserable souls,
Which fly to burn the forehead of the sky,
The forehead of God, that root of lightnings,
To add to His arms, fiery ornaments...?
Oh, what did I say...? Hit me with lightning,
God, crush the immense thought of this atom,
Which dares to yearn, dive into the sky's depth,
Climbing the awesome ladder of the stars...!
Greetings to you, God, of trembling beings,
Of rays, of blossoms, waves and syllables,
You who has snatched the rose of my forehead and flame of my eyes,
Vibration of lips, the flight of my soul,
Gave clouds to my eyes, panting to my heart,
You said you'll bring me Your smile at death's door,
Of course, You've made an afterlife for me,
Life of infinite ray, fragrance, prayer;
But if my last breath will henceforth be lost
Here in the mute and the murmurless fog,
Let me now become a jaundiced lightning,
Twist around your name and roar endlessly,
Let me be a curse and thrust in your side,
And let me call you, "God, my enemy!"
Oh, I'm shivering; I'm pale, I'm so pale,
As if my insides are boiling like hell...!
I am just a sigh in black cypresses,
A dry autumn leaf close to falling down...
Oh, give me a spark, spark that I may live...!
What, after a dream, to embrace cold grave...?
This destiny, God, how it is so black,
Is it drawn perhaps with the mire of tombs...?
O, give to my soul, just a drop of fire,
I still want to love, and to live and live;
You, stars of the sky, fall down in my soul,
Give a spark, give life, to your poor lover!
It's spring with no rose on my pale forehead,
The rays in the sky don't give me a smile;
At night my coffin , the stars like torches,
The moon always cries, explores abysses.
There are those who have none to cry for them,
It's for that reason that He put that moon;
And the dying one wants only two things,
First life, then someone who will cry for him!
In vain the stars have written "love" for me,
In vain the bulbul taught me how to "love",
In vain the breezes inspired me with "love",
And the clear mirror showed me so youthful,
In vain the shrubs fell silent around me,
The secretive leaves never did take breath,
So my noble dreams may not get disturbed,
They've allowed me to dream of her always,
And in vain flowers and blossoms of spring,
Always incensed the altar of my thoughts...
Oh, yet all of them have ridiculed me...
It's God's ridicule, the world already...!
1871
REGRET
(A day later)
By Bedros Tourian (1851-1872)
* Translated from Armenian by Shant Norashkharian *
Yesterday when in cold sweat
I was taking a black nap,
And a pair of dried roses
Were burning upon my cheeks,
Of course on my death forehead
A paleness was glittering,
And I had a flight of death,
I heard my mother's sobbing...
I opened my weary eyes,
And I saw my mother's tears...!
Oh those were pearls of true l—move,
Artificial and fake pearls...!
My mother had immense pain,
I myself was that black pain...!
Ah, my head then became stormed...
I vomited this black flood...
Oh, forgive me now my God,
For I saw my mother's tears...!
1871
LITTLE LAKE
By Bedros Tourian (1851-1872)
* Translated from Armenian by Shant Norashkharian *
Why are you rapt, little lake,
And your waves do not frolic,
Did a pretty girl, perhaps,
Stare into your sad mirror?
Or is it that by sky's blue
Your waves have been charmed perhaps?
And by clouds which bud with light,
Which resemble your bubbles?
Melancholic lake of mine,
Let us become intimate,
Let me also love like you,
Be subdued, still, and ponder.
As many waves as you have
So much thoughts has my forehead,
As much bubbles as you have
So thousand wounds has my heart.
And if they poured in your lap,
Constellations of the sky,
Still you cannot resemble
My soul which is immense flame!
Over there the stars don't die,
And the flowers don't wither,
The clouds do not make wet there,
When you and air are peaceful.
Little lake, you are my queen,
Even if wrinkled by wind,
Still within your restless depth
You will keep me quivering.
Many had me rejected,
"He has just a lyre", they said;
One, "he's trembling, colorless",
The other said: "He will die!"
Nobody said, "wretched boy,
Why is it that he smolders,
Perhaps he is beautiful,
Love him so he may not die?"
Nobody said, "Let us tear
This boy's heart so sorrowful,
Let's see all that's written there..."
There is fire there, not a book!
There are ashes...memories...
Let your waves grieve, little lake,
Since in your depth sorrowful
A hopeless one has stared...!
1871
THE TURKISH WOMAN
By Bedros Tourian (1851-1872)
* Translated from Armenian by Shant Norashkharian *
It is evening; the horizon is fiery;
A cart passes like a coffin, lingering,
A beautiful woman throbs there lying down,
Is that a girl of the sunset, is it, God?
And if she stares,
You'd say - right now she will faint!
She resembles a statue made from beeswax;
How pale she is...it seems as if her bright veil
Is a fine shroud from her roses colorless;
Illuminates her God with a pair of eyes;
And if she smiles,
You'd say - Oh, now she will pass!
She wants to look, but then she faints even more,
Her heart smolders burning with love like incense,
She is a queen of fragrance and of rays,
Tired butterfly which asks for rest on flowers;
And if she moves,
You'd say - right now she will fly!
Like an ocean agitated, is her side,
She wants to love...she wants to faint with a kiss,
To be worn down, wither, fall tired in the grave,
To squeeze as well the last drop from love's fiery cup;
If she blushes,
You'd say - now she'll be inflamed!
Bee of the heart, as Lamartine would call her,
Whose flower which she sucked is heart, love's honey,
And I call her virgin whose heart is the sky
Of vast love which still does not have horizon;
And if she speaks,
You'd say - now she will expire!
She burns always, she burns but does not expire,
Like the temple's lamp lighted by poor women,
Like the stars in the night she likes to glitter;
She is a flame taken from love's fiery side...
And if she dies,
You'd say- now she will be born!
1871
* Translation Copyright 1997 by Shant Norashkharian *
