ANSWER TO THE YEARS
Lutpulla Mutellip
tr. Joshua L. Freeman
Lutpulla Mutellip
tr. Joshua L. Freeman
years are the great steed on which time rides by.
Rivers flow and dawns break, they never repeat,
the galloping years run away with our lives.
The years chase each other with quickening pace,
without looking back they abscond with it all.
Nightingales barely fly in the orchard of youth
before the leaves start to crumple and fall.
So graceful a chapter of life is youth,
yet the end of the chapter comes much too soon.
Each page that is torn from the calendar
is a petal that falls from youth’s delicate bloom.
This tree without leaves grows so dry and forlorn,
as the tracks are buried by a wind of years.
The generous years never come empty-handed,
to girls they bring wrinkles, to boys they bring beards.
Yet cursing the years is no answer at all,
let them pass ever onward and make their own plans.
Man too will collect what he chooses from time,
the wilderness flowers to life in his hands.
So much can be done in the years’ great expanse,
triumphs rise up like peaks as the years make their way.
Only last night the infant still lay there so small,
yesterday he was crawling, he’s walking today.
Young people chase fearlessly after the years,
their fearless grandchildren will come in their wake.
They’ll gather up flowers to place on the graves
of those martyred last night for a better world’s sake.
Let the years gild my face with a beard if they will,
I too will grow strong in the years’ wide embrace.
My creation, my poems will all leave their mark
on the neck of each year that passes in haste.
In the hour of struggle I shall not grow old,
my verse lights the way with the blaze of a star.
In the mountains of struggle, to fall back is death,
those who dare and endure are the ones who go far.
I’ll hold fast to the hand that was hardened in gunfire,
with my banner held high, I won’t stray from the path.
In the wastelands of struggle I’ll never grow tired,
we will march on the wide road of triumph at last.
There is no need to howl with laughter, oh years,
I won’t rage against you—I’d rather be dead.
Your efforts to age me are all made in vain,
my son will fight on in the battle ahead.
Oh ocean of years, though your waves may be fierce,
our ship cuts its way through the furious roll.
You may threaten us all with the passage of years,
we answer that creation makes the years grow old.
Aqsu, January 1944
Translation copyright © 2024 by Joshua L. Freeman. Translation based on L. Muṭṭalib, “Yillārghā jawāb,” in M. Noruzof and Elqem Ekhtem, eds., Ālmānākh, 18-19 (Ghulja: Sharqi Turkistān inqilābchil yāshlār teshkilātining meṭbeʿesi, 1947).