21 december 2025

21 december 2025

John Bjarne Grover

Cornelis Vreeswijk (1937-1987) was born in the Netherlands but was a swedish troubadour in the Bellman tradition, a swedish national song-poet who never became a swedish citizen but who was more swedish in his language than most swedes are: "Somliga går med trasiga skor / säg, vad beror det på". Swedes can not say that because it is all too swedish. A computer could not understand this point: What do you mean? Anybody can of course say that?

Sweden has catholic (and jewish) traditions even if the state church is protestant.

Here is the song with running translation - here is the swedish text for this song - and here it is translated with Google Translator.

Here follows Vreeswijk's poem 'Somliga går med trasiga skor' (in my appr. transl.) to the left and my comments to the right:

Some people walk in worn-out shoes. ragged, tattered shoes
Say, what's the reason for that? say, what depends the shoe on = say, what is the earth upon which it rests
God our Father who in Heaven lives hence heaven and earth
maybe wants it like that. God's will is more 'ragged, tattered' = unordered than a computer

God our Father who in Heaven lives
heaven and earth
closes his eyes and sleeps sweetly/well. God is very human
Who cares about some worn-out shoes human will does not care about the ragged, tattered
when one is old and tired. tired = trött cp. swedish trottoir = Bürgersteig, sidewalk - is God (ah so human) a sweetish/swedish citizen?

Who cares about how the days proceed/walk
the time is a walking shoe = on the trottoir
they wander/walk as they want/will. the days walk as they want
Citizen, in one hundred years Bürgersteig state dependency and time
you do no longer exist. lasts longer than the human lifespan (cp. step-span)

Then somebody else has taken your chair/stool.
has taken your thwart-place? taken your sit-i-sense-hip?
That you do/will not know about. the cloud of unknowing
You know neither rain nor sun the sensations of human life
down in your dark grave. the nothingness of mysticism = night of the senses

Who cares about how the nights proceed/'father'
the night/fathering of the spirit - 'far' = 'track'
I do not care at all = I do not care a 'track' time is a (double) wagon track - 'spår' = 'track'
if only I can have my face remain[ing] the face kissing the earth?
hidden in my beloved's hair. in the unordered uncombed hair (like a worn-out shoe?) - at the Godhead?

I am a dubious/doubtful character/nature
the doubt is the earthen nature
who is not good for much. 'duger ej mycket till' is more swedish than swedish
Behind a corner Death stands in ambush. på lur = norwegian for 'on sleep', 'in ambush'
He takes me when he wants. the will of death

Some people walk in worn-out shoes
some walk
untill they have stopped walking. untill they stop
The Devil who in Hell lives the devil who wants to catch you
will have a good laugh then. because he was cheated by his delusion? cp. 'gott skratt'

Whistling....

'På lur' = death in ambush = God asleep? The doubt is shifted over to be caught by Devil/death after the turning point of the night of the spirit (cp. also Cornelis Vreeswijk's name) - that is because time is a double wagon track - and the devil gets a 'gott skratt' = 'a gott laugh'

somliga går med trasiga skor - norwegian 'somle' = 'to be delayed'
säg vad beror det på - ror = rows, that is backwards, on a thwart

Vreeswijk interpreted the decay of human life and drift through life towards death in a mystic sense in some of his songs.

Here is another of his 'mystic songs' - 'Balladen om herr Fredrik Åkare och den söta fröken Cecilia Lind' = 'The ballad of Fredrik Åkare/Traveller and the sweet miss Cecilia Lind'. (Here on another youtube URL).

One naturally guesses how the ballad could have progressed - and then there is 'Fredrik Åkares morgonpsalm' (his morning psalm) - here is the original swedish text with translation: Is this only a trivial romantic song about the old man's bad conscience after having been with the young Cecilia Lind - or is it high mysticism of nature - such as being about the earth under a fir tree? Is there light coming up from the earth there? Cecilia Lind is the soul who is attracted to the God. She is 'soon 17', says the other song - and here it says 'My mother wasn't awake' - which could have meant that she was not really 16 although that is nearly 'soon 17'.

Some of the religious symbolism is present also in Vreeswijk's Felicia's sonnet - here is the text and here it is translated with Google Translator. ('Driv-hus' = 'green-house', but that is probably not the intention). There are certain similarities with my own sonnet of 5 april 1997 (a part of my PhD dissertation). I wrote this sonnet while I was working with the first poem in 'The Endmorgan Quartet' (the work with this poem extended over several months) - although then the forest was not of copper but rather silvery.

22.12.2025: Here is a story about the mystic Santa Theresa and copper, and here is Santa Theresa painted on a copper plate - both examples include birds etc.

21.12.2025: The man who called himself 'John Grøver' after 1969 once told a story about Vreeswijk which I think he said had been in the newspapers: Vreeswijk had one evening brought with him two women home but when it turned out that they were transvestites he put a knife into the bottom of one (or both?) of them. I dont know if (political?) intrigue could have accumulated around him, or how early that could have been. There is also a trivial spoon on his name which could look like 'får Nelly's Cressvik' = 'gets Nelly's Cressvik' - cp. 'Gressvik' by Fredrikstad and Henry 'Cheswicke' Rawlinson who deciphered cuneiform.

22.12.2025: 'Fanil Sarvarov' died in a bomb attack this morning. 'Få[r] nils arv av Rov' = 'get[s] nils inheritance from Rov/robbery/prey' ('rov' = 'predation', 'prey', 'robbery', 'røv' = 'behind', 'buttocks'). Fjellheim on Gressvik published 'Rov' on 02.10.1995. I have not read the book but notice that my own 'The Dreamer' was completed in the end of may 1995 (whether that be relevant or not - I have not plagiarized Fjellheim). Would the bombing in Moscow be suggestive of the idea (on basis of what I wrote yesterday) that Fjellheim would be the son of God - cp. Vreeswijk's 'Fredrik Åkares morgonpsalm' and the idea that Cecilia Lind is the soul drawn towards God? When I in the autumn 1999 applied for changing my name from 'Grøver' to 'Grover', there were a series of bomb attacks against apartment buildings in Moscow and other places while the application was handled. (Yesterday I also wrote something on my home computer about the idea of Norway having to keep itself upright which even could have been seen as a 'reason' for certain chemicals in 'Ukraine'?)

(On 17 and 18 december there were also some apparent firecrackers somewhere in the neighbourhood).

Some people walk in worn-out shoes.	ragged, tattered shoes
Say, what's the reason for that?	say, what depends the shoe on = say, what is the earth upon which it rests
God our Father who in Heaven lives	hence heaven and earth
maybe wants it like that.	God's will is more 'ragged, tattered' = unordered than a computer

God our Father who in Heaven lives	heaven and earth
closes his eyes and sleeps sweetly/well.	God is very human
Who cares about some worn-out shoes	human will does not care about the ragged, tattered
when one is old and tired.	tired = trött cp. swedish trottoir = Bürgersteig, sidewalk - is God (ah so human) a sweetish/swedish citizen?

Who cares about how the days proceed/walk	the time is a walking shoe = on the trottoir
they wander/walk as they want/will.	the days walk as they want
Citizen, in one hundred years	Bürgersteig state dependency and time
you do no longer exist.	lasts longer than the human lifespan (cp. step-span)

Then somebody else has taken your chair/stool.	has taken your thwart-place? taken your sit-i-sense-hip?
That you do/will not know about.	the cloud of unknowing
You know neither rain nor sun	the sensations of human life
down in your dark grave.	the nothingness of mysticism = night of the senses

Who cares about how the nights proceed/'father'	the night/fathering of the spirit - 'far' = 'track'
I do not care at all = I do not care a 'track'	time is a (double) wagon track - 'spår' = 'track'
if only I can have my face remain[ing]	the face kissing the earth?
hidden in my beloved's hair.	in the unordered uncombed hair (like a worn-out shoe?) - at the Godhead?

I am a dubious/doubtful character/nature	the doubt is the earthen nature
who is not good for much.	'duger ej mycket till' is more swedish than swedish
Behind a corner Death stands in ambush.	på lur = norwegian for 'on sleep', 'in ambush'
He takes me when he wants.	the will of death

Some people walk in worn-out shoes	some walk
untill they have stopped walking.	untill they stop
The Devil who in Hell lives	the devil who wants to catch you
will have a good laugh then.	because he was cheated by his delusion? cp. 'gott skratt'

Whistling....