Ernst Ranseier in Gaelic

Postojna 1997

Than a h-uinneagan air falbh,
Tha ‘s na cailleachan ri cnuasachd.
Tha ‘n clò-gorm a’ cleitearnach
Anns a’ ghaoith.

Bhon uinneig agam tha mi faicinn
Cladh an àite,

Eachdraidh air a tòrradh
Fo thuim den ùir an solas na maidine
‘S na croisean-iarainn
Fo ghrìogagan den driùchd.

Sunday afternoon. Cheviots and Highland cattle. Wandering.
Douglasie. A Hurlimann outside a churchyard. I hear bells ring.

Maurice Chappaz

Tuathanach a’ Teannachadh a Chinn

‘S beag orm na h-ainglean
Ach bidh mi gan sgrùdadh.
Bidh mi beachdachadh
Air na beathaichean ‘s gan tuigsinn.

Tha trì rudan a tha math san oidhche:
Suirghe,
Sealltainn air a’ ghealaich
No ‘g ùrnaigh.

In the Aare on a holm or - as in Inchnadamph or Abbotsinch -
An inch, a herring-gull, a tern. All that way from the Little Minch!

Still fresh and clear. The last snow. Spring in the Jura.
Eyebright and mountain avens. The first swallow. Aqua Panna. Aqua-Pura.

S. Corinna Bille

Uaimh

Bha uaimh os cionn lios nam fìonan
Agus boireannach òg na broinn.
Cha nochdadh i ri duine
Ach uaireannan thigeadh luchd nam fìonan
‘S an t-eagal orra.

Sheall i san sgàthan air chumadh uighe,
Na sùilean aic’ air an socrachadh
Agus theireadh iad cho math
Gun robh nathair mar chuideachd aice.

Rinn i suas na sùilean
Aice le sulphate,
Am beul aice le dearcan dubha
‘S chuir i gagain bheaga ‘n crochadh
Ris na cluasan.

I wash and peel a Schalenkartoffel and place it against my ear.
Can that be the Shannon flowing into the Atlantic I can hear?

The snow on a terminal moraine in the Jura’s beautiful indeed
In May, melting and moving at speed. At glacial speed.

I go back through the new-growth woods and pick things up like a child.
Bar. Fuchs. Hase. Luchs. Reh. Wolf. Auf und Ab. Wald und Wind und Wild.



The old folk tend to their allotments in the evening near the village hall
In Kirchenfeld. It’s not a bad way to end it all at all.


I light up when I see the Bunnhabhainn and Bruichladdaich in rows,
Out on the town en Suisse. And Talisker and Isle of Jura. It probably shows.


There’s Rhum up there and all. I’m getting used to the spiel.
Glenlivet, Glenfiddich and so forth. Glendale. Glenshiel.


I walk down a long Durchgang beside the Aare and under the ground.
I should be afraid. I feel sound. I feel sound.

Snowblindness. That middle-aged man there going grey and bald
In the reflective glasses on the way down from Grindelwald.

Alain Rochat in Gaelic

Tha h-Uile Càil Geal

Ciamar a tha h-uile càil
Anns an t-saoghal geal
Thuirt an sùileachan
‘S e togail nan sùl
A dh’ionnsaigh an t-seòmair-mhullaich.

An sneachda mar chuinnlein.
An solas bhon lòchran mar anart-bàis.
Dèile ach cùis-uabhais
Nach follaiseach.

Tha h-uile càil geal.

Out, everything in its place. Perfect. A little sad.
The Aare in Bodenacherfare and Muribad.

Under the permasnow, look!, a spring, the first Alpine thyme, avens, edelweiss
As old as Torridonian sandstone and Lewisian gneiss.

I look up from the computer. It’s nearly quarter to three.
Outside the Polizei, birds are tweeting and twittering away in the bare plane tree.

Lochs and glens

An old wifie stares, then snores, opposite me, face like a stone –
Don’t I know her? - all the way to Interlaken in the Ruhezone.


I’m disorientated - first it’s a Bort, next the last departure from First, then Jungfraujoch.
I can see nearly all the way home: Alpinglen, Egg, Locherboden, Appin, Beinn eadar dà Loch.