A journal of art + literature engaging with nature, culture, the environment & ecology

Mongolian and Buryat Folk Songs

Nazarii Nazarov, Kyiv, Ukraine

 

Translated by Nazarii Nazarov 

 

 

1

 

Oh lynx from the Southern Yangay

As big as a foal

With spotted front legs

Oh how comely you are

 

2

 

When summer was gracious and happy

Oh my winged birds

Why didn’t you come singing 

From the shores of a big distant sea? 

 

3

 

A bird from the northern realm 

Is singing on the northern slope

A herdsman—my younger son—

Is dashing with a hook in his hand

 

4

 

With a sacred pile of stones on your top 

Khangay

Blessed by myriads of men

Khangay

With a winter shelter at your foot

Khangay

Blessed by many—by everybody 

 

 

A foal—born to a red mare

On the top of a mountain—

During the solemn race he overtook 

My snake-like bay horse 

  

 

Riding a red comely camel 

I will go across vast Gobi

Under the flame of hot sun 

I will get tanned—riding



 

Sources of the original texts: 

1: А. Дылгырова. Песенное творчество закаменских бурят: традиция бытования. - Улан-Удэ, 2008. 

2 - 6: П. Хорло. Народная песенная поэзия монголов. - Новосибирск: Наука, 1989. 

 


 

Nazarii Nazarov lives in Kyiv, Ukraine, where he teaches Ukrainian and Russian, and explores poetical traditions of the world. He writes his poetry and prose in English, Ukrainian and Russian. His interpretation and translation of Mongol and Buryat folk songs depicts the world of nomads that still coexists within the natural environment, and the brotherhood they share with creatures like horses, lynxes and camels. 

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