Blind from the light of many candles
You1 don’t see in the darkness
You clothe yourselves in velvet and silk
And you fatten yourselves on richly decked tables.
Our grievances are irritating to you
You can’t and don’t want to understand us.
You live in excess, full to the point of weariness
And what bothers2 you, you don’t want to see.
We stand out here like ghosts
While inside you dance and laugh.
We see you in bright windows -
You see only the night outside.3
Blind from light you couldn’t guess
That “misery” is more than a word.
You’ve never looked into the big eyes
(Of) the children that die on the edge of the streets.
Between rats, garbage and curses,
“Living” only means to decay4
People without courage have5 nothing but hate and rage
But you can’t see our fist.6
We stand out here like ghosts
And hear how you laugh inside
We are shadows behind the window -
You only see the night outside.
What is wrong7 must be changed.8
It can’t go on like this anymore!9
God will bless those who change it
And curse those who don’t see.10
Why?
Why… are you blind from the light of candles?
1. you plural, as in “you all”- throughout the song “you” is used in this plural form.2. or “disrupts/interferes with”3. ie; “you don’t see us standing outside”4. ”zugrunde” or “zu Grunde” literally translating as “to the ground” as in “knocked to the ground / levelled” etc. The phrase “zugrunde gehen” (literally “to go to the ground”) is usually used to mean “to collapse/decay/perish”. In this case it could mean either that living/life in this world (ie; the slums and poverty) means only to decay and die, or that their lives are reduced to the very basics of surviving as opposed to actually ‘living’.5. literally “in people without courage is nothing but…”6. ie; our anger7. “verkehrt”=“wrong/amiss” coming from the verb “kehren”=“to return” and the prefix “ver” (usually implying change or a negative bent to the verb). In this case it implies contortion (twisted back on oneself) or “incorrect return” as in “inverted/backward/inside-out”, all accepted translations of “verkehrt”.8. literally “someone must change (it)”.9. or “no more”10. or “see nothing”, both referring (I assume) to ‘not seeing’ or ‘ignoring’ the injustice of revolution-era France