Prometheus’s First Address

By: Mahakavi Laxmi Prasad Devkota

 Translated by: Padma Devkota

23

“O Men! In this world, pettiness always

keeps your head bowed down! Fearful of extinction,

weighed with doubt, uncertain! In your heart,

death casts its dark shadow like a sun-eclipse,

blocking the life-giving light. As if

troubled by the sun-swallowing demon,

Rahu called, you are lost in the darkness.

The future’s uncertain. To disperse your clouds,

to spread fresh light all over the sky

of your race, to resuscitate afresh

your near-death life, to create a future,

I, Prometheus, have taken avatar on earth.

24

“Heed my counsel. Man shall not die.

His is a long-lived, golden future.

He only has to recognize that

which is indestructible, the seed

immortal. You are neither worms that live

just for a day, nor locusts .... Your empire

spreads over the animal kingdom.

You shall not die like vegetation, Men,

growing in one spot, developing

and decomposing where it once stood.

In you, there is an eternal spark.

25

“This is day-break; the golden morn shall follow.

Knowledge shall be had unknowingly.

Rise with hope, O eager folks! Struggle

with darkness, your foe. The individual dies,

the race survives. Nutrition abounds

for the whole world; only he shall be immortal

who recognizes the immortality

of the race. That drop of water which falls

to mingle with water shall not die.

That which falls on dust shall disappear unseen.

That which selfishly basks alone in the sun

shall transform into short-lived vapor

which dissolves in the air.

26

Today there’s an eclipse; an eclipse

which is the shadow of destruction

of the universe, an absence of light,

an impurity of death in the world,

unclean, during which cognizant man

needs to stay pure, keeping in mind

his accountability on earth.

O Men! In this shadowy, dire moment,

partaking light, strengthen all your hearts.

27

“The lord of heaven, intolerant by nature,

irritable towards humans beings

because of the mess--as when seeing

feeble sticky long-legged creatures

in the water, an awful rage appears

in human eyes--Zeus is blind with rage

at humans today. The lining of his brow

is deep red, like the horizon,

red with clouds of dust before the storm.

In the line of his brow lies your destruction.

It is clearly written today.

Terrible destruction.

28

“But fear not, Men! I stand by you.

I, Prometheus. I, friend to man. I, protector of man.

I, the enemy of Zeus’s blind rage.

Intolerant of injustice, a god

in support of humans! Strongly threatened,

all heaven cowers down before Zeus.

I become a rebel against the tyrant

of heaven, for the sake of man.

Do not fear, O Men! I am friend of man.

29

“A boatman ferries a boat full of people

across the water’s current ... a clever boatman.

Have faith in divine genius. I too am

an immortal. Thought is light, like that of the day;

a single sun diffuses thousands of rays

all over innumerable paths.

Such are pure, exciting thoughts, death of darkness.

In the empire of wisdom shall be

the endless victory of thought. O world of feelings!

Follow me, O uncertain, shadow-frightened men.

30

“Fear not though fear advances in cruel billows ...

like suspicion of annihilation moves

on water where a stone has dropped at night.

Races anxious of fall are feeble:

halted constructions, stalled development,

worn and torn by constant thought of death,

burning terribly. Anxiety is

the mother of the pyre. Be optimistic.

Recall the sunshine. Recall the light.

Worship Usha, the light at day-break.

Attempt to fly. Hope is half a life.

Struggle with darkness, your life. In support

of your right, I shall bear very cruel torture.

31

“Don’t look down towards darkness, look up

like even vegetation does. Your hands

and feet, use them. Try. Don’t die in dejection,

helpless men. Don’t be deterred by tyranny.

Strength is truth. Know that power is not brutality.

There’s a great deal of brutality

in the king of the gods too. He has taken

a cruel vow, not to tolerate the weak.

I rebel against that, Men. I won’t allow

destruction of your racial seed.

I am your protector.

32

“What might that lord of heaven do to me

after all? That one blind with rage?

Anger is the strength of a fever

of unhealthy nature, sudden and unnatural rage,

a sudden heat which troubles and makes taut

the burning nerves, lowering the span of life.

He might thrash, might beat and might make blood spurt

from the body; he might storm on the rebel,

a super-speed hurricane; but I

shall remain a robust oak. He might cause

suffering in the name of punishment,

but I shall transform that into an yearning,

turning the joys of experience into lessons.

I have conquered fear, O Men! Fear is merely

the quivering of lifeless strands of hair,

slim doubts on one’s own existence!

I am ready, ready to mount the storm,

ready to drown in a sea of tears,

ready to be pierced, stabbed, beaten, clubbed,

nailed and trodden over by the scoundrel’s iron feet;

ready to be judged in eternity

by unending suffering today;

ready to pass the toughest test. Mine alone

is the nectar of truth, the sweetness of humanity!

Remove these two and the world is poison.

33

“I am a rebel. I defy heaven:

the power-principled, brute force of vexing

and irrational heaven .... I am a supporter

of divinity. Truth is emperor;

untruth, slave. Truth is my weapon. I have brought,

O Men! for you a gift from heaven--

a gift of my pity--the seed of the fire of the gods!

In the belly of this reed lies a power,

a strange spark of fire! As if it were

a flaming spark of gold surrounded by darkness

before twilight on the eastern peak,

in which there is infinite secret power ...

having spread all over the universe,

the secret of light! This spark is the mother

of all art. In it lies the flames of all

the happiness of civilizations.

34

“Imagine a ten thousand branched tree,

the root of the world. In darkness

its unknown roots are mysterious.

Innumerable systems of endless

juice-circulating nerves, as great epochs

and ages come, grow and wither away,

stand firmly against a thousand storms ...

always green and beautiful; birds in flight,

facing the light, possessing a golden fruit.

Such shall be human life, O Men!

Construct that with the warmth of this spark.

Become immortal! Become indestructible!

Become beautiful! Conquerors of the earth!

Become supreme! O Men! Defeat the gods!”

(From: Third Canto of Prometheus)