The Factory

Written by Nikola Vaptsarov

English translation by Peter Tempest

Music by DJ ShemZee

Recited by Effluence

A factory.

Clouds of smoke above.

The people - simple, the life - hard, boring.

Life with the mask and greasepaint off

is a savage dog snarling.

You must tirelessly fight,

must be tough and persist,

to extract from the teeth of the angry,

bristling beast a crust.

Slapping belts in the shed,

screeching shafts overhead,

and the air is so stale you can't easily

 deeply inhale. Not far off the spring

breeze rocks the fields, the sun calls...

Leaning skyward the trees shade - the factory walls.

How unwanted, forgotten and strange are the fields!

They have thrown in the dustbin the sky and its dreams.

 For to stray for a second or soften your heart,

is to lose to no purpose your strong worker's arm.

You must shout in the clatter

and din of machines for your words to pass over.

the spaces between. I shouted for years - an eternity...

I gathered the others too shouted in chorus - the factory,

the machinery and the man in the farthest darkest corner.

This shout forged an alloy of steel and we armoured our life with its plate.

Just try putting a spoke on the wheel - it's your own hand you'll break.

You, factory, still seek to blind us with smoke and soot layer on layer.

In vain! For you teach us to struggle, we'll bring the sun down to us here.

So many toil-blackened faces

 under your tyranny smart,

but one heart within you tirelessly

 beats with a thousand hearts.