By devil’s power or magic arts,
Or something worse than either two,
If I just catch her smile, this girl,
I feel the whole world round me whirl!
All this I could endure, if badly,
But one eve the devil had me
To pass a night in Milon’s cabin:
Just at dawn, the moon still shining,
Flames rose in the new-mown field;
From somewhere came the girl, - just think!
Sat by the fire to catch the glow,
Marked in the cabins how all slept,
And then unwound her lovely wreath of hair;
Down fell her tresses to her waist,
She comb’d her locks about her bosom,
With clear voice singing elegy,
Like nightingale in bushy tree:
So mourn’d she her husband’s brother,
Son dear-lov’d of Ban Milonitch -
He who was slain full year ago
By Turks in Duga’s rough ravine.
The Ban would grudge that she should cut such hair,
For more he prized her tresses fair
Than his own son who perished there.
This girl’s laments, they tore my heart;
Her glowing eyes my spirit fired;
Clear as the moonlight shone her brow;
I wept - shed tears just like a child!
How blest is Andriya so to leave the world,
When eyes so glorious thus weep o’er him,
When lips so lovely thus do mourn him.
Of course, not written by me