Below is a reproduction of the text of "Let Poland be Poland" by Jan Pietrzak (1976), the song chosen by the Solidarity movement for its unofficial hymn: It was written after the unrests of Radom and Ursus factories and was not a call to armed struggle, nor a prayer for the country. It was, rather, a meditation on past wars, fought by generations of Poles to "Make Poland, Poland."
This is Info-Poland's partial cache of http://www.utexas.edu/courses/polish/_private/p324-prl.htm. The original page is no longer posted and the link to it is broken.


Z glebi dziejow, z krain mrocznych
Z puszcz odwiecznych, pol i stepow
Nasz rodowod, nasz poczatek,
Hen, od Piasta, Kraka, Lecha.		 From the depths of history, from murky lands,
From eternal forests, fields, and steppes.
Our people, our beginning,
From Piast, Krak, and Lech.

Dlugi lancuch ludzich istnien
Polaczonych mysla prosta:
[Zeby Polska, zeby Polska,
Zeby Polska byla Polska.] bis

A long chain of human beings
United by a simple thought:
That Poland, that Poland,
That Poland be Poland.
Wtedy, kiedy los nieznany
Rozsypywyal nas po katach,
Kiedy obce wiatry gnaly
Obce orly na proporcach.		 When an unknown fate
Scattered us to the corners of the earth.
When foreign winds chased
Foreign eagles on banners.

Przy ogniskach wybuchala
Niezmozona nuta swojska:
[Zeby Polska, zeby Polska,
Zeby Polska byla Polska.] bis

At the hearth there would burst out
an overwhelming and familiar note:
That Poland, that Poland,
That Poland be Poland.
Zrzucal uczen portret cara,
Ksiadz Sciegienny wznosil modly,
Opatrywal woz Drzymala
Dumne wiersze pisal Norwid.		 A pupil threw down a portrait of the czar,
Father Sciegienny offered his prayers
Drzymala fixed up his wagon,
Norwid wrote proud verses.

I kto szable mogl utrzymac
Ten formowal legion wojska,
[Zeby Polska, zeby Polska,
Zeby Polska byla Polska.] bis

And whoever could hold a sword
would organize army legions
That Poland, that Poland
That Poland be Poland.
Matki, zony, w mrocznych izbach
Wyszywaly na sztandarach
Haslo: "Honor i Ojczyzna",
I ruszala w pole wiara.		 Mothers, wives, in dark huts
Would sew on banners
The slogan: `Honor and the Fatherland'
And faith would set forth into the field (of battle)

I ruszala wiara w pole
Od Chicago do Tobolska.
[Zeby Polska, zeby Polska,
Zeby Polska byla Polska.] bis

And faith would set forth into the field
From Chicago to Tobolsk
That Poland, that Poland
That Poland be Poland.

This text was written in 1976 by Jan Pietrzak to be performed by his cabaret troup, to music supplied by the well-known composer of popular songs Wlodzimierz Korcz. The song presents as a uniting theme of Polish history the aspiration of Poland (in the sense of the Polish people) to be Poland (a free state of that people). The song, which would conclude the cabaret's performances, became so popular that Pietrzak was often called on to sing it again as an encore. Censorship authorities forbade him from repeating the song, so that he would stand silent while the audience sang it. In less trouble times, the song was awarded first prize at the Opole music festival in 1981. During martial law it could not be performed in public at all. In 1995 Jan Pietrzak ran for president of Poland and received approximately 1% of the vote.

Notes:

Rev. Piotr Sciegienny (1801-90) organized a revolutionary conspiracy among peasants in the Lublin area against Czarist rule. He wrote a political tract in 1842, under the guise of a papal encyclical, which defended a Christian version of socialism. He was discovered and sentenced to a Siberian labor camp.

Michal Drzymala: a peasant who in 1904 tried to buy a plot of land in the Prussian partition despite laws forbidding a Pole from constructing a permanent residence on such land. He fought a legal battle for ten years and attracted great publicity to his case, living on his property in a caravan wagon.

Cyprian Norwid (1821-83) is a well-known Polish Romantic poet and philosopher who did not shy away from political themes relating to political repression in Poland.