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Ack. I need to put a stanza of this poem into the next installment of the Legolas story I'm posting. The original was from a poem by Tolkien that I'm trying to translate into Elvish, and happens to suit my chapter well. I've had to change it so that you could believe it's a wood-elf's song: that means I've rephrased things so the meter works.

See how badly I've mangled this, pretty please!



I Gair Vedui (The Last Ship)
from The Tolkien Reader

Ir l thinner Friel tirn am:
I fuin thind gwannant.
I aurlinn, aew goll, palan *
Gaun nallant lim a maeg.
Gelaidh duir, minuial gael **
In emlin echuianner. ***
Gwaew athrant, i rhing a lhain
Tr thlaiss rennianner.

When stars faded, Firiel looked out:
The gray night was going.
The day-singer, golden bird, far away
Crowed a clear and shrill cry.
Trees were dark, dawn was pale,
The yellowhammers awakened.
A wind passed, that cool and frail
Strayed through the grass.

*aurlinn ~ my reconcstruction for "rooster", based on dlinn, "nightingale". Day-singer as opposed to night-singer.
** ~ I think you don't lenit adjectives when the sentence structure is: "Subject [is] adjective", right?
*** ~ I actually found a soundfile of these little guys. They're small and cheeping, so they fit the original poem's meaning better without forcing me to throw in too many words.


Here's Tolkien's original:

"Firiel looked out at three o clock;
the grey night was going;
far away a golden @#%$
clear and shrill was crowing.
The trees were dark, and the dawn pale,
The waking birds were cheeping.
a wind moved cool and frail
through dim leaves creeping."