Waar ik God mee aanriep,
die stem was de mijne.
Hij zou naar mij luisteren.
God zoeken was
mijn dag en mijn kwelling.
Ik stortte mijn handen
de nacht in: geen hand kwam terug.
Ik was niet meer te vleien.
Als ik aan u dacht
had ik geen vrede,
mijn ziel was in haar klacht omhuld.
U hield mijn oogleden open,
zo kwam ik op vroeger dagen,
jaren van verhalen.
Ik dacht aan de nachten toen ik zong:
zo was ik met mijn hart
bijeen:
wij onderzochten:
heeft hij voorgoed losgelaten?
geldt de belofte niet iedere generatie?
Vergeet ook hij?
Al is het mijn kwelling,
ik denk aan jaren van zijn rechterhand,
spreek nog van zijn daden,
blijf zijn wonderen op mij nemen.
Zijn dag is de verborgene:
waar zie ik wat ik zeg?
Toch bent u de God
die de zonen van Jakob en Josef
noemden, toen zij nieuw leven kregen.
De wateren zagen u wel,
en beefden
tot in afgronden.
Uit de wolken
kwam zicht voort.
Komen uw stralen verder?
Uw weg blijft een zee,
uw pad een groot water.
U moet hen hebben geleid
als een herder, in de dagen
van Moses en Aaron.
--Lloyd Haft (uit De Psalmen in de bewerking van Lloyd Haft, Querido 2003; herdruk Uitgeverij Vesuvius 2011)
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Brief bio sketch
Lloyd Haft (1946- ) was born in Sheboygan, Wisconsin USA and lived as a boy in Wisconsin, Louisiana and Kansas. In 1968 he graduated from Harvard College and went to Leiden, The Netherlands for graduate study in Chinese (M. A. 1973, Ph. D. 1981). From 1973 to 2004 he taught Chinese language and literature, mostly poetry, at Leiden. His sinological publications include Pien Chih-lin: A Study in Modern Chinese Poetry (1983/2011; published in Chinese translation as 发现卞之琳: 一位西方学者的探索之旅 in 2010) and A Guide to Chinese Literature (with Wilt Idema, 1997). His liberal modern Dutch reading of Laozi's Daode jing was published as Lau-tze's vele wegen by Synthese in September 2017. His newest books in English are translations: Herman Gorter: Selected Poems (Arimei Books, 2021), Zhou Mengdie: 41 Poems (Azoth Books, 2022), and Totally White Room (Poems by Gerrit Kouwenaar, Holland Park Press, 2023). He has translated extensively into English from the Dutch of Herman Gorter, Gerrit Kouwenaar, and Willem Hussem, and from the Chinese of various poets including Lo Fu, Yang Lingye, Bian Zhilin and Zhou Mengdie.
Since the 1980s he has also been active as a poet writing in Dutch and English. He was awarded the Jan Campert Prize for his 1993 bilingual volume Atlantis and the Ida Gerhardt Prize for his 2003 Dutch free-verse readings of the Psalms (republished by Uitgeverij Vesuvius in 2011). His newest books of poetry in Dutch are Intocht (Introit) and Beluisteringen (Soundings), published by Uitgeverij Van Warven in November 2023.
After early retirement in 2004, for a number of years Lloyd Haft spent much of his time in Taiwan with his wife Katie Su. In June 2019 he was named a Distinguished Alumnus of National Taiwan Normal University. In addition to writing and translating, his interests include Song-dynasty philosophy and tai chi. For many years he sang in the choir of a Roman Catholic church of the Eastern Rite in The Hague.
Since the 1980s he has also been active as a poet writing in Dutch and English. He was awarded the Jan Campert Prize for his 1993 bilingual volume Atlantis and the Ida Gerhardt Prize for his 2003 Dutch free-verse readings of the Psalms (republished by Uitgeverij Vesuvius in 2011). His newest books of poetry in Dutch are Intocht (Introit) and Beluisteringen (Soundings), published by Uitgeverij Van Warven in November 2023.
After early retirement in 2004, for a number of years Lloyd Haft spent much of his time in Taiwan with his wife Katie Su. In June 2019 he was named a Distinguished Alumnus of National Taiwan Normal University. In addition to writing and translating, his interests include Song-dynasty philosophy and tai chi. For many years he sang in the choir of a Roman Catholic church of the Eastern Rite in The Hague.
