by Edgar Quinet
THE TRUMPETS
With my powerful breath, my task is the most beautiful and the easiest. Always the same note, always the same sound, always the same word: Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus. Merely by repeating it as it is written, I make so much noise that the void quivers and reverberates, and the heavens love me more than the viols, the mandoras and the clarions.
THE VIOLS
1.
Beneath a golden bow that harasses, stabs and tears me, I palpitate, shiver and moan. Like a virgin beneath her veil, I sob. My voice propels tears. I should like to sing; and my vibrant weeping streams over my strings, already taut. Still crawling at the foot of our edifice of sound, I exhaust myself climbing the resounding steps to the summit, where vertigo forces me to descend. Dolor! Dolor! Dolor! that’s the word I know best, and Love, which pleases me the most, and Infinity, the one that makes me sigh so much.
2.
Alone I sing, alone I listen, alone I descend to the bottom of my well of harmony. In the distant heavens, no one understands me, no one replies to me, no one loves me. Oh, how sad my soul is! I am a poet but I have no words, I only have my sobs. And now, golden bow, let me be; it’s the clarions’ turn to resonate.
THE CLARIONS
Over your vibrant souls, over your murmurs, over your sparkling silver-threaded sighs I extend, like a princely mantle, my songs of gold and crimson. I whinny better than a horse. My voice is more resplendent than a sunlit sword. In battle I have resonated. On the lips of the heralds-at-arms I have published, in tournaments, the commands of kings and queens. Just now I am publishing, on the lips of angels, new heavens.
THE ORGAN
Beautiful golden clarions, shut up. I’ve inflated my lungs with air; it’s my turn to sing.
Storms, hail, tempests are amassed in my giant bellows; it’s me who makes the thunder. All that resonates beneath the vault of the sky—forests that growl, nations that fall, cities that buzz, names that resound—emerges from a thousand divine pipes. I am the voice that speaks and shouts in realms and ruins. When I raise my diamond key, a people rises to its feet and resounds; when I let it fall again, the people falls, and falls silent. And the plaint of empires, crumbling one after another, is the song with which I amuse myself with my bellowing notes in my golden case.
For the moment, however, there’s one word that I can’t say; my voice is insufficiently mixed with incense. The lyre can do it better than me.
THE LYRE
1.
Future! Future! Future! is that the winged word that your thousand pipes lack? Only the breath of morning, touching me, makes it resonate. It vibrates by itself, without a bow. To listen to it, the heaven pause. Like a flower, they open their calices to receive its dew.
2.
Suspended from the vault, my three strings are as large as the world. Under the finger of my player, who goes back and forth and never tires, the first, spun from the tresses of stars, is the voice of the universe. The second, of pure gold, is the voice of an empire. The third, which I like the best, the smallest, the softest, always warm with sighs, is the voice of a young woman as virginal as me; and the word they all know together, with no deception, is Harmony.
3.
You who are passing through the crossroads of infinity, pause; form a circle around me. Although old, my melody is always new. The one who made it is the master to whom I belong. Beneath his hardened fingers, a thousand centuries ago, I learned it in order to make the round-dance of the stars, worlds, skies, people and hours who link hands circulate and sway around him. Again, again! let the round begin again! let the suns rotate more rapidly! Let the waltz of the spheres and their satellites pass and pass again, whirling, until they are dizzy, until they say, staggering: “Satellites, where are we? Let the amorous stars, lifting their veils, drop the bouquets from their bosom.”
4.
When I play more softly, nodding her head, Eternity sings her song: “When I was born, in what place, I do not know. Without worrying about it, in my turn, I spin, spin on my wheel heavens and news stars to embroider my robe.
5.
“Many gods, one after another, have come to my door to espouse me without further ado, all clad in rubies, all borne on clouds, all holding golden globes in their hands, saying: ‘Choose me for your husband; I shall live more than a thousand years.
6.
“But the one who pleased me had neither rubies nor gold. His tunic was torn. I wanted to mend it for him. His side, bleeding from a spear-wound, I wanted to heal. His crows was made of Judean thorns; I wanted to wear it.
7.
“His father was too poor to dress him in glory; I was rich enough for two. With my mantle I dried his harsh tears. But thousands upon thousands of years have chanced my fancy. Find me another, younger god, my messengers, whom I love more. Without deceit, this time, I shall be faithful.”
THE VIOLS
Enough, I can stand no more. If we must keen like disheveled sisters, we’ll weep our tears spun from virgin silk and silver together.
THE TRUMPETS
I’m too bored in silence. The dead are dead. If it’s necessary to awaken them, I resound better than the lyre.
THE CLARIONS
If it’s necessary to fight, I’ll whinny with my brazen mouth.
THE LYRE
1.
Alleluia! Alleluia! No more death! no more war! no more tears! all dolor is consoled, when I resonate.
2.
Look! Two amorous souls that have long wept, and about whom a poet spoke to me, are living here in one bosom, in one heart, and no longer form more than one angel. Like the brood of a swallow in spring, they seem themselves to be assembled in a single being, beneath the same transparent wing. In a single breast, two joys, two memories and two worlds are quivering. Half-man, half-woman, for two lives there is but one breath. And when they brush my strings, they have but one mouth to say: “Is that your voice? Is it mine? I don’t know.”
3.
Thus, henceforth, earth and heaven are betrothed. It’s at the end of the universe that they will marry. Together they will be an infinite archangel, who will hide every bitter valley beneath its flight. The earth will be the baser and heavier body, in order to crawl. The heavens will be the azure-tinted wings, deployed and more sublime, in order to soar. The cortege that will follow them will be rich and populous, consisting of the most diligent stars of the morning, then the most silvery stars of the evening, and then the most ornate stars of the night. Let’s go and see them on the road, before they’ve all passed by.
FINAL CHORUS
Everything concludes in accord. The mystery is over. Taking away their seats, the gods have already left. Spectators, go home too, quietly, as before, each in your trouble commenced, in which your life will inevitably be worn away. Across mountains and valleys, high and low, like a cavalier laden with messages, our fearless harmony has risen and descended, passed and rebounded. In front, it has collided with the abyss; the abyss echoes it; and then the sky, and lower down the star, and lower still the earth, over its broken string. While going home, continue to listen to the murmur of Infinity that rumbles around us, and that sigh, and that silence, and that sound afloat, and, in time, no longer anything—no, nothing at all, I said—and in that sonorous nothing, one word still, down there, which vibrates eternally…and eternally fades away.
EPILOGUE
CHRIST, alone, in the vault of the firmament
1.
Since the moment when Ahasuerus returned my chalice to me, the wound in my side has reopened; my tears are flowing into the abyss. The four winds are drawing lots, dividing up my tunic of clouds. The breath of my bosom is causing the lamp of the world, which is going out, to flicker. Around my steps, my feet drag as snakes once did over the stones of Golgotha, and my long hair is massing on my heart, like a storm swollen with the tears of the earth.
2.
Universe, ruined basilica, which had a stairway of stars to climb to your infinite tower, a
nd which has attached me to your vault, why have you let the hour pause on your clock? Why have you let the nave of your firmament fall in fragments on to your pavement? Why have you broken, in anger, the sky-blue panes in your window? Why have you told the nettles to rise up as far as my seat, the worms to gnaw away the feet of my bench, and the silver stars to sound their knell in the heavens, as on the eve of the feast of the dead?
3.
Ah! It’s because the sky is empty; it’s because I’m alone in the firmament. One after another, all the angels have folded their wings, like the eagle when it grows old. My mother Mary is dead; and my father Jehovah has said to me at his bedside: “Christ, my age has passed. I have lived enough centuries of centuries; the worlds are weighing me down. My diamond eyelid has worn away gazing at my lighted suns. My bald head has been battered too long by the inexorable tempest; I’m cold. My feet have made their eternal circuit too often; I’m weary. My tongue in my mouth has summoned too many worlds, one after another, to oblivion; I’m thirsty. My old age is too great; I can no longer see your aureole shining. There—your father is dead!”
4.
The firmament has shaken its god from its branch as the fig-tree shakes off its leaves. My roof has been removed and death is raining on my face. As far as the worlds swarm, I can longer hear anything but my heart beating; as far as my eyes can see, I can no longer see anything but my blood trickling from my wound. Yes, flow, my blood; flow from the furthest corner of my heart; this time Judean linen will no longer staunch you, Syrian balm will no longer dry you up; and spring water will no longer wash you away.
5.
Where are my fisherman’s nets in my house at Nazareth? Where are the gifts that the mage-kings gave me in my cradle? Where is my agony in the Garden of Olives? Then, the sun made my aureole, the lions of the desert and the gryphons licked my wound and wept. Now, the suns gaze at me, and no longer arm my bosom; the wind passes by without asking who I am; the void, at its door, is winding my shroud, and for my aureole, places its empty crown on my head.
6.
Adieu, worlds, stars, morning and evening dew that greeted me by name when I was a little child. Adieu, mountain lakes whose cups I filled, clouds that I bore on my shoulders like a blessed palm. Sea, oh, who will take care tomorrow of all your waves while you’re asleep? Birds of the woods, who will make your little suits of down when you go to the fields? Desert of Arabia, who will give you something to drink at the edge of your cistern when you are thirsty? Poor voyaging star, who will warm you up in his hands when you go astray in the cold night? Flood of suns, infinite tide, who will say to you tomorrow, at any hour, in any language, in any place: “I love you,” when you sigh so sadly as you lick your shores?
7.
Worlds, stars, morning and evening dew, is it true, then? In the night, in the day, far away, nearby, is there no longer anyone at all?
THE ECHO
No one.
CHRIST
1.
Blacker than Pilate’s bile, doubt fills my cup and moistens my lips. If I didn’t put my finger in my wound, my mouth would no longer know my name, and Christ would no longer believe in Christ.
2.
What have I been? Who am I? What shall I be tomorrow: a word without life or a life without a word; a world without God or a God without a world? Perhaps nothing.
3.
Father, mother, my church with the incense of so many souls, was that all a dream, then? oh, nothing but a divine dream on my eternal couch? and the cry of the universe, punctuated by such a long sigh—was that my voice, all by itself, thoughtlessly, stammering in my sleep?
4.
My banner of heaven, was that nothing but my shroud? and that infinite rain that rained everything, was that, then, my tears falling from my eyelids, too heavy to feel them flowing?
5.
Life, truth, lies, love, hate, bile and vinegar mixed together in my ciborium; yes, the universe: that was me. And me, I’m a shadow; I’m the shadow that always passes; I’m the tears that always flow; I’m the sigh that is always repeated; I’m the death that is always agonizing; I’m the thing that always doubts its doubt, and the oblivion that always denies itself.
What! no one after me in the night? no one in the day? no one in the well of the abyss?
ETERNITY
Me, I’m still in the well of the abyss. My bosom is a woman’s, but I’m not your mother Mary; my forehead is that of a seer, but I’m not your father Jehovah.
CHRIST
Help me to weep.
ETERNITY
I have no tears to weep in my great eyelid.
CHRIST
Where have you shed them?
ETERNITY
My eyes are dry.
CHRIST
The worlds are orphans. Love them in my stead, when I am no more.
ETERNITY
In my bosom I have neither love nor hate.
CHRIST
Were you nursed by a virgin, as I was?
ETERNITY
No one nursed me. I have neither a father nor a mother.
CHRIST
Who will bury you, then, when you too climb your Calvary?
ETERNITY
I neither climb not descend; I have neither summit nor valley, neither joy, nor dolor.
CHRIST
It’s me who has dried up your dolor in your well; it’s me who got up before you to sate myself on the tears of everything; it’s me who drunk all the bitterness in the cup of day and the cup of night; it’s me who cried, as soon as dawn broke: “Give me your sadness,” to the passing wind, the declining day, the flowing wave, the drowning sun, and the firmament that turned aside to sigh. My chalice was hollowed out slowly in my hand, as profound as the world; take it in my stead.
ETERNITY
Now it’s broken in my brazen fingers; it’s fallen into the gulf.
CHRIST
And me too; you’ve broken me; my life was in my chalice; you’ve emptied it too soon.
ETERNITY
1.
No, it was time. On the Golgotha of Heaven, recommence your passion. In the potter’s field where I dry out the clay of my vases, sow yourself for a second time, like an ear of wheat that you will reap yourself. The firmament, henceforth, will be your cross; the golden stars will be the nails in your feet; many clouds, passing by, will give you’re their absinthe. Time has run out. Descend into death again, like a landlord to his cellar, to bring back life; and go search once again for a pinch of your dust in our new sepulcher, to knead a new world, a new heaven and a new Adam.
2.
Around your sepulcher, carved in the rock, lying there on their elbows, are sleeping peoples, like your guards on Calvary on the night of your passion. One has unlaced his hauberk, another his breastplate, another his shiny coat of mail; and the blade of faith that was hanging along each thigh has fallen from every hand. Nothing visits your summit any longer but the hungry eagle that searches on your cross for is prey and his divine pasture. Everything is asleep. Lift up your heavy stone, therefore; resuscitate for a second time. Magnified by death, by more than twenty cubits, come and march side by side, celestial revenant, with the universe, your strayed disciple, who is going forth on his road to Emmaus, without recognizing you;46 break with him, on his table, a second loaf of more gilded wheat. With your deeper wound in your side, your feet in Hell and your head in the firmament, reappear—ah, reappear on my roof in the assembly of worlds, a finger over your lips, as you did at the assembly of your apostles, in the house of the Magdalen.
3.
To transfigure yourself a second time, go forth into a new Bethany, to a new Tabor made of al summits set atop one another. Like your apostles, in the dust, while the universe swoons at the foot of your hill, God-Giant, rise, rise up higher than an entire Heaven. Arms extended to embrace all things, take the spheres and clouds away with you, to my last still-disinhabited summit.
CHRIST
It’s all over. Lay me down in
my father’s sepulcher. So be it.
ETERNITY
For the Father and the Son I have hollowed out a grave with my hand in a frozen star, which rotates without company and without light. The night, on seeing it so pale, will say: “That’s the tomb of some god.”
And then, I shall be alone for the second time. No, not yet alone enough. I’m weary of these worlds that wake me up with a sigh every day. Crumble, worlds! Hide away!
THE WORLDS
Where?
ETERNITY
There in that crease of my robe.
THE FIRMAMENT
Should I take away all my stars, as a reaper takes away the flowering grass that he has sown?
ETERNITY
Yes, I want them all to be harvested; it’s their season.
THE SPHINX
When you whistled to summon me as a messenger, I followed you everywhere; and I hollowed out your black abyss with my claw; let me lie down at your feet again.
ETERNITY
Go away, like them. I’ve already thrown my serpent, which was biting its tail in despair, into my abyss.
THE VOID
You’ll keep me, at least; I don’t take up much room.
ETERNITY
But you make too much noise. No being, no nothingness; I don’t want anything but me.
