Centre for Romanian Studies

Poetry in Translation (CCCXIX): Rudyard KIPLING
(1865-1936), ENGLAND – “Mother o’ Mine”, “O, mamă, dulce mamă!”

Mother o’ Mine
Rudyard KIPLING (1865-1936)

If I were hanged on the highest hill,
Mother o’ mine, O mother o’ mine!
I know whose love would follow me still,
Mother o’ mine, O mother o’ mine!

If I were drowned in the deepest sea,
Mother o’ mine, O mother o’ mine!
I know whose tears would come down to me,
Mother o’ mine, O mother o’ mine!

If I were damned of body and soul,
I know whose prayers would make me whole,
Mother o’ mine, O mother o’ mine!

* * * * *

O, mamă, dulce mamă!
Rudyard KIPLING (1865-1936)

De aş fi spânzurat la răscruce de drum,
O, mamă, dulce mamă!
Eu ştiu c-al tău dor, m-ar urma ori şi cum,
O, mamă, dulce mamă!

De aş fi înecat, în adanc de ocean,
O, mamă, dulce mamă!
Ştiu că lacrima ta nu ar curge în van,
O, mamă, dulce mamă!

Dac-al meu trup şi suflet în gheenă ar fi,
Numai ruga ta, mamă, m-ar putea mântui.

O, mamă, dulce mamă!

Rendered in Romanian by Constantin ROMAN, London
© 2015 Copyright Constantin ROMAN, London

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SHORT NOTE: The mother-son relationship, the most prevalent in Kipling’s fictions is best reflected his poem “Mother o’mine”. The repetition of o’ in the refrain visually shows the wholeness of the maternal love and that of the mother-son union, as well as the opening of a gap, or a lack, in himself, which the male child calls upon his mother to fill in.
(‘The Cambridge Companion to Rudyard Kipling’, ed. Howard J. Booth, chapter ‘Kipling and gender’, op. cit. pp. 69)