Tartu 2024 Grand Opening „All is One!“ Texts in English

Ladybird, ladybird,

show me where my home is.

Ladybird, ladybird,

show me where my sons are.

Ladybird, ladybird,

show me where my love is.

Ladybird, ladybird,

show me where my heart is.

Ann went to the granary,
brought me some barley bread,
I gave the bread to the threshing barn,
the threshing barn gave me straw,
I took the straw to the white cow,
the cow gave me milk,
I gave the milk to the cat,
the cat gave me kittens,
I took the kittens to the fox,
the fox gave me wolf’s-claw,
I gave the wolf’s-claw to the pigs,
the pigs gave me a side of bacon.

Health to the farmer’s daughter,
she gathered together the bones,
wrapped them in a white rag,
left them on a stump in the woods –
a white rabbit baby was born from it,
precious ancient creature.

The wolf called from the edge of the valley:
“Come to me, baby rabbit,
I will sew you a new pair of shoes,
I will knit you a pair of socks up to your heels!”

I

Waters locked, waters locked!

Through nature’s lucid windows

on the meadow

your dim starlight spawns,

a spectre is haunting Europe

on the dark screens of our unsubmissive mind,

the night’s sky, her un- or sub- or superconscious past –

the cave, from verb to verb, the grammar-grimoire,

duh-duh, duh-duh, so dim the throbbing stars,

bashes to bashes, thrust to dust,

psyche’s basement, psyche’s base,

her meaning’s cave, her wavering foundation,

the inundated cavern, blast of past pictures, rotten feasts,

my body is my temple, your body is my, is my,

all nature’s bodies are my temple

for whom my heart’s athirst.

II

A feast is haunting Europe, her spectral gristle,

morphing reflections on the cavern’s porous walls,

war, war, the womb of horse and hattock, spring and spawn,

to ride, to ride, the forest spawns a friendly foe,

dark chestnut as a tree of light, to ride, to ride,

a flower’s death in psyche’s distant grove,

our river’s flow coagulates in twilight’s throes,

through water burns a solid lucid flow,

the pasture resurrects the mind,

don’t think, don’t die,

the forest resurrects the act –

the porous earth breathes out the past,

breed, breed, the mushrooms’ silent throb,

slow, slow, my psyche, ease your flow,

the heat of sun’s unwilling wilful gift –

the soul’s immortal factory,

to see the light, to go, to die,

to die, to go, be born, give birth, to go, to go

a bliss

my town is passion’s throbbing grit

our body’s unrelenting factory

eternal

in a solar chestnut we will burn,

our rhizome’s inner flames athrob,

from a solar chestnut we are born.

A duckling swims down the river.

Mother dearest, don’t be cross with me,

I will meet my end in foreign lands.

Who will take me to my grave then?

Strangers will my last companions be.

Won’t you grieve then, mother dearest?

Oh, my son, how could I then not grieve?

You are always in my heart.

A duckling swims down the river.

This is the city.

A city has wondrous streets and boulevards that create a certain network of joy, energy and information.

New citizens are being born and raised here, and when they grow up, their children and grandchildren also grow up in the same city. This is called eternal circle of life.

Oh, look. A student. And there’s more of them.

Big companies all around the world are hunting for them. As soon as they grab one they bring the student to the ones in need of knowledge and new technologies.

The citizens of this beautiful city. Their days are filled with buzzing and running, crawling and discovering.

On busy working days there is no stop to finding new challenges.

But the weekends they usually like to spend with their loved ones in their nests they call “home”.

As the real estate situation in cities might change new nests are being constantly looked for.

Here you can see some of their finest nests, holes and caves. Together they form a strange ecosystem where everything is connected with everything.

The connections in the city are both intense and diverse. People talking on the streets. Grownups bringing their children to schools or youngsters having fun on basketball courts. The street networks are there not in order to separate people, but to bring them together.

As the citizens have different needs and skills it is all about balance. To maximize each individuals potential humans have created something they call “living together”.

City is like a model of universe where even the tiniest of elements might have an effect on everything. Yes, even on the fate of universe.

Just like the universe city is endlessly changing, developing and expanding. New ways for living together are constantly being invented and fundamental values carefully preserved.

Even a little child can change the destiny of a city forever. What a city is today is not what it was yesterday or what it will become tomorrow.

I

would like to see it all

but the hours in the day –

just like the year – are 24

I should get on my way

 

I’ve got Võru Põlva Räpina

and Kastre to swing by

dear Office of the Waterways

would you be so kind

 

and really push the boat out for this fest

(an automatic gearbox would be best)

 

the boat would come in handy for

our journey to the southern shore

and maybe take us up the postal road

 

I ploughed my boat along the land

and left a mess behind

but then they built a promenade

along the furrow line

 

I turn the prow downstream and there

in my imagination

release my songs straight into

the water circulation

 

dearest lower rivercourse of mine

why don’t you come up to Tartu sometime

 

the world’s a pretty kettle of fish

but future still seems, well, bright’ish

Livonia is keeping spirits high.

 

the Mother River filling up my pail

hold on so hard your fingertips turn pale

when life feels like a hellbound handcart

the true art lies in finding art

in 2024 I will survive

‘cause Mother River’s filling up my pail

hold on so hard your fingertips turn pale

when life feels like a hellbound handcart

the true art lies in finding art

in 2024 I will survive

your amygdala wants stimulating

southeast all the doors are gaping

20 places waiting to be explored

 

we are rising up like sparks

from one huge bonfire

this corner of the world has got

the resilience required

 

first and last you’re held by Earth

you too should hold her dear

in the bog, the… whatsit, sphagnum moss?

well, don’t go treading there!

 

to get to Rõuge you must seek

a path that smells of meadowsweet

 

there’s time out there, there’s woods as well

but just right now, the light’s so dull

it’s likely you could trip and crack your skull

 

and Mother River’s filling up my pail

hold on so hard your fingertips turn pale

when life feels like a hellbound handcart

the true art lies in finding art

in 2024 I will survive

‘cause Mother River’s filling up my pail

hold on so hard your fingertips turn pale

when life feels like a hellbound handcart

the true art lies in finding art

in 2024 I will survive

your amygdala wants stimulating

southeast all the doors are gaping

20 places waiting to be explored

 

I’d really like

to set a fire sculpture alight

can I please

and then it might

turn out we need

to visit Pokuland

but Mother River’s filling up my pail

hold on so hard your fingertips turn pale

when life feels like a hellbound handcart

the true art lies in finding art

in 2024 I will survive

‘cause Mother River’s filling up my pail

hold on so hard your fingertips turn pale

when life feels like a hellbound handcart

the true art lies in finding art

in 2024 I will survive

your amygdala wants stimulating

southeast all the doors are gaping

20 places waiting to be explored