Här kommer en dikt om Mihai Eminescu, översatt till engelska och skriven av en annan välkänd rumänsk poet, Marin Sorescu:
They had to have a name by Marin Sorescu
(published in "The Past Perfect of Flight", translated by Adam J. Sorkin)
"Eminescu never existed.
There existed only a beautiful land
On the shore of a sea,
Where waves make hoarly tangles
Like the uncombed beard of a king.
And rivers like flowing trees
In which the moon weaves its swirling nest.
And there also existed common people,
With names like: Mircea the Old, Stephen the Great,
Or plainer folk, shepherds and ploughmen,
Who took simple pleasure in telling
Poems around the fire in the evening -
"Miorita" and "The Evening Star" and "The Third Letter".
But because they never stopped hearing
The barking of their dogs by the sheepfold,
They went forth to do battle against the Tartars
And the Avars, the Hauns, the Poles
The Turks.
In the time left free
Between dangers
These peoples made their flutes
Into downspouts
For the tears of the grieving stones,
So their doinas of lament would flow along the valleys
From the mountains of Moldavia and Wallachia,
From the Bârsa Land, Vrancea
And the other regions of Romania.
There also existed dense forests
And a youth who talked with them,
Asking them why they rock and rock though there's no breath of wind.
This youth with large eyes
As large as our history,
Immersed in thought, journeyed
From the books in Cyrillic to the book of life,
Continually counting the poplars of light, of justice, of love
Which always came out she loves me not.
There also existed lindens,
And two lovers
Who could make their flowers bloom like falling snow
In a kiss.
And birds, and also clouds
That, never stopping still, wander the sky above them
As across long, quickened plains.
And because all these
Had to have a name,
A single name,
They were named
Eminescu."
