Daylight: You Who Wronged

By Czeslaw Milosz

You who wronged a simple man
Bursting into laughter at the crime,
And kept a pack of fools around you
To mix good and evil, to blur the line,

Though everyone bowed down before you,
Saying virtue and wisdom lit your way,
Striking gold medals in your honor,
Glad to have survived another day,

Do not feel safe. The poet remembers.
You can kill one, but another is born.
The words are written down, the deed, the date.

And you’d have done better with a winter dawn,
A rope, and a branch bowed beneath your weight.

Washington, D.C., 1950

白昼之光：你错了
切斯瓦夫·米沃什

你冤屈纯真之人
还在罪恶中爆出狂笑，
身边聚集着一群蠢货
为的是混淆善恶， 模糊界限，

虽然每个人都向你膜拜，
说你的道路光明正确，
为你的荣耀夺取金牌，
沾沾自喜于又一天的苟且，

不安吧。 诗人铭记。
你可以杀害一个， 但他后继有人
白纸黑字记录下， 你的罪行和日期

一个冬天的黎明本该更适合你，
一条绳子，和一根被你压弯的树枝。