Poetry
ვაჰ, დრონი, დრონი
Not translated into English
Alexander Chavchavadze · 1820
Synopsis
The poet looks at the days of the past, savoured as so sweet, which have fled like a dream. He has lost his companion and the strength to live, and is amazed that people still see him standing. In every stanza the same lament about the times returns, and the same answer: whatever happens, he will not follow the changing course of the age and will remain faithful to the vanished time.
Context
The poem can be read in two ways and Georgian criticism holds them together: the author speaks in it of the one love to whom he gave himself once and for all, and the same constancy is heard as that of the patriot toward an abolished kingdom. What made the text's fortune is its obstinate repetition of the same line, learned and quoted like a motto. The form comes from Persian court poetry, which the author practised while he was reading and translating the European Romantics: the two inheritances cross in these few stanzas.
Who it is for
A very short poem, with no French edition. It helps to know that what serves as the title is the first line, as is often the case in early Georgian poetry.
Prizes and reception
The most quoted text of the poet whom Georgian literary history regards as the first of its Romantics.