To the youth

Text: the Norwegian journalist, poet, author, playwright, and political activist Nordahl Grieg.

Surrounded by enemies, enter
your time!
During a bloody storm –
we prepare for battle!
Perhaps you ask in fear,
uncovered, openly:
What shall I fight with,
What is my weapon?

Here is your protection against violence,
here is your sword:
Faith in our life,
the value of man.
For the sake of all our future,
seek it and cultivate it,
die if you must – but:
increase it and strengthen it!

Silently goes the sliding band of grenades.
Stop their drive towards death,
stop them with spirit!
War is contempt for life.
Peace is to create.
Throw in your strength:
death shall lose!

Love – and enrich with dreams –
everything great that was!
Go towards the unknown,
wrest the answer from it.
Unbuilt power plants,
unknown stars –
create them, with life’s
spared
bold minds!

Noble is man,
the earth is rich!
If there is need and hunger here,
it is due to betrayal.

Crush it! In the name of life
shall injustice fall.
Sunshine and bread and spirit
be owned by all.

Then the weapons
sink down, powerless!
If we create human dignity,
we create peace.
He who with his right arm
bears a burden,
precious and inalienable,
cannot murder.

This is our promise
from brother to brother:
we will be good to
the earth of men.

We will take care of
its beauty, its warmth –
as if we were gently carrying a child in our arms!

Translated into English by Per-Kaare Holdal

Dedicated to the youth of Ukraine

Copyright © S2pU

Music: Support to the people of Ukraine

Nordahl Grieg (1902 – 1943) was a Norwegian journalist, poet, author, playwright, and political activist. He was one of our most prominent poets in his lifetime, and became one of the “young dead” when he was shot down in a plane over Berlin in 1943.

“To the Youth” was written by Nordahl Grieg in 1936 at a time when Europe was on the brink of a new war. The poem’s theme of war and solidarity has had a profound impact on many generations of young people.