Original
Без Держави
Сади весняні розцвілиЯскравим цвітом коло хати,Й додому нас уже б гукнула мати,Скоріш, скоріш побігли б ми.
Побігли б ми... Але ж куди?Немає в нас тієї хати,Немає в хаті в нас і мати,Бо ж сироти на світі ми.
Не ми одні не маєм Мати,Народ не має рідної держави,Немає дядько, де поспати,Хоча багато для Держави здобув він слави.
Translation
Without a State
The spring gardens have come into bloom,bright blossom all around the house,and mother would have called us home already —quick, quick, we would have run.
We would have run… But where to?We do not have that house,and in that house we have no mother,for we are orphans in this world.
Not we alone are without a Mother —the people has no state of its own.Uncle has nowhere to lay his head,though for the State he won much glory.
About the poem
The orchards bloom by the house and mother would call the children home — “but where? we have no house, no mother: we are orphans.” The private image opens into the public one: a people without a state of its own, an uncle who won glory “for a foreign State” and died of cold and hunger. “Why do we need a foreign state? Why do orphans need a foreign mother? No!” The cherry orchard by the house is Shevchenko’s, and the poem knows it; the last stanza is a condition rather than a promise: the orchards will bloom again “only when you, at least, do not betray your native state.”