Poems by Janina Degutyte

Janina Degutyte is one of the most beloved of Lithuania's poets. Her uncompromising eye took in the realities of life in Soviet occupied Lithuania, while retaining a lyric, romantic (in the better sense of the word) voice. Degutyte was one of the first newly emerged poets writing in the post-war period to be noticed by émigré critic Rimvydas Šilbajoris; his praise of her integrity, her poetic voice, caused her to be read in the émigré community years before many other Lithuanian poets. Born in Kaunas, Degutyte graduated from the department of history and philology at Vilnius University in 1955. She worked for a number of years as a teacher and as an editor of various literary publications. Her verse was first published in 1957. Degutyte made her debut as a poet of moral uncompromisingness and heroic spirit and had published more than a dozen collections of poetry until her death in 1990. Her poetry is charged with an emotional intensity and a dramatic concern for human existence. It is also marked by a romantic view of the world, improvisation in verse structure and emotional exclamatory phrases. She has perfected the verse-form of nature miniatures. Degutyte is also known as an author of several books of verse for children.

Through a high gate, decorated
with wreaths and slogans...
Through a high gate
I enter
Like a guest
The dale,
Encompassed by woods, clouds, and flights of swans.
And I accept
With lips chapped by north winds
The black night and the white day
As bread and salt.

Translated by Marija Stankus-Saulaitis