The Penguin Book of French Poetry

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The Penguin Book of French Poetry Page 47

by Various


  O Mémoire Combien de races qui forlignent

  Des Tyndarides aux vipères ardentes de mon bonheur

  Et les serpents ne sont-ils que les cous des cygnes

  Qui étaient immortels et n’étaient pas chanteurs

  Voici ma vie renouvelée

  De grands vaisseaux passent et repassent

  Je trempe une fois encore mes mains dans l’Océan

  Voici le paquebot et ma vie renouvelée

  Ses flammes sont immenses

  Il n’y a plus rien de commun entre moi

  Et ceux qui craignent les brÛlures

  Descendant des hauteurs où pense la lumière

  Jardins rouant plus haut que tous les ciels mobiles

  L’avenir masqué flambe en traversant les cieux

  O Memory How many corrupted races From the Tyndarides1 to the fiery vipers of my bliss And are snakes not merely the necks of swans That were immortal and did not sing And now my life is renewed Great vessels pass and pass again Once more I dip my hands into the Ocean

  Here is the liner and my renewed life Its flames are prodigious There is nothing more in common between me And those who fear the burns

  Descending from the heights where light thinks Gardens wheeling higher than all the shifting skies The masked future blazes across the heavens

  Nous attendons ton bon plaisir ô mon amie

  J’ose à peine regarder la divine mascarade

  Quand bleuira sur l’horizon la Désirade

  Au-delà de notre atmosphère s’élève un théâtre

  Que construisit le ver Zamir sans instrument

  Puis le soleil revint ensoleiller les places

  D’une ville marine apparue contremont

  Sur les toits se reposaient les colombes lasses

  Et le troupeau de sphinx regagne la sphingerie

  A petits pas Il orra le chant du pâtre toute la vie

  Là-haut le théâtre est bâti avec le feu solide

  Comme les astres dont se nourrit le vide

  We await your pleasure O my beloved

  I hardly dare look at the divine masquerade

  When Desirade1 will loom blue on the horizon

  Beyond our atmosphere rises a theatre built by the worm Shamir2 without tools Then the sun returned to shine upon the squares Of a coastal town that appeared upstream On the roofs the weary doves were resting

  And the sphinx flock returns to the sphinxfold On tiptoe He will hearken all his life to the song of the shepherd Up there the theatre is built with solid fire Like the stars that feed the void

  Et voici le spectacle

  Et pour toujours je suis assis dans un fauteuil

  Ma tête mes genoux mes coudes vain pentacle

  Les flammes ont poussé sur moi comme des feuilles

  Des acteurs inhumains claires bêtes nouvelles

  Donnent des ordres aux hommes apprivoisés

  Terre

  O Déchirée que les fleuves ont reprisée

  J’aimerais mieux nuit et jour dans les sphingeries

  Vouloir savoir pour qu’enfin on m’y dévorât

  And here now is the spectacle And I sit for ever in an armchair My head my knees my elbows a hollow pentacle Flames have sprouted on me like leaves

  Inhuman actors luminous new beasts Give orders to tamed mankind O Earth Torn asunder and stitched together by the rivers

  I would prefer night and day in the sphinxfolds To seek knowledge so that I might at last be devoured there

  Nuit rhénane

  Mon verre est plein d’un vin trembleur comme une flamme

  Ecoutez la chanson lente d’un batelier

  Qui raconte avoir vu sous la lune sept femmes

  Tordre leurs cheveux verts et longs jusqu’à leurs pieds

  Debout chantez plus haut en dansant une ronde

  Que je n’entende plus le chant du batelier

  Et mettez près de moi toutes les filles blondes

  Au regard immobile aux nattes repliées

  Le Rhin le Rhin est ivre où les vignes se mirent

  Tout l’or des nuits tombe en tremblant s’y refléter

  La voix chante toujours à en râle-mourir

  Ces fées aux cheveux verts qui incantent l’été

  Mon verre s’est brisé comme un éclat de rire

  Rhenish Night

  My glass is filled with a wine that quivers like a flame Listen to the slow song of a ferryman That tells of seeing seven women in the moonlight Twisting their long green hair down to their feet

  Stand up sing louder while you dance a roundelay That I may hear no longer the ferryman’s song And place beside me all the golden-haired girls With motionless gazes and tightly coiled plaits

  The Rhine the Rhine is drunk where the vines find their image All the gold of night falls quivering in its reflection there The voice is still singing itself into a death rattle Of those fairies with green hair who cast a spell on summer

  My glass has shattered like a burst of laughter

  Liens

  Cordes faites de cris

  Sons de cloches à travers l’Europe

  Siècles pendus

  Rails qui ligotez les nations

  Nous ne sommes que deux ou trois hommes

  Libres de tous liens

  Donnons-nous la main

  Violente pluie qui peigne les fumées

  Cordes

  Cordes tissées

  Câbles sous-marins

  Tours de Babel changées en ponts

  Araignées-Pontifes

  Tous les amoureux qu’un seul lien a liés

  Bonds

  Cords made of shouts

  Ringing of bells across Europe Centuries hanging

  Rails binding the nations We are no more than two or three men Free from all bonds Let us join hands

  Violent rain combing the smoke Cords Woven cords Undersea cables Towers of Babel changed into bridges Spider-Pontiffs All the lovers bound by a single bond

  D’autres liens plus ténus

  Blancs rayons de lumière

  Cordes et Concorde

  J’écris seulement pour vous exalter

  O sens ô sens chéris

  Ennemis du souvenir

  Ennemis du désir

  Ennemis du regreté

  Ennemis des larmes

  Ennemis de tout ce que j’aime encore

  Other more tenuous bonds White beams of light Cords and Concord

  I write only to exalt you O senses O precious senses Enemies of memory Enemies of desire

  Enemies of regret Enemies of tears Enemies of all that I still love

  Fête

  A André Rouveyre

  Feu d’artifice en acier

  Qu’il est charmant cet éclairage

  Artifice d’artificier

  Mêler quelque grâce au courage

  Festivity

  For André Rouveyre

  Steely pyrotechnics How enchanting this illumination is An artificer’s artifice To mix a certain grace with courage

  Deux fusants

  Rose éclatement

  Comme deux seins que l’on dégrafe

  Tendent leurs bouts insolemment

  IL SUT AIMER

  quelle épitaphe

  Un poète dans la forêt

  Regarde avec indifférence

  Son revolver au cran d’arrêt

  Des roses mourir d’espérance

  Il songe aux roses de Saadi

  Et soudain sa tête se penche

  Car une rose lui redit

  La molle courbe d’une hanche

  L’air est plein d’un terrible alcool

  Filtré des étoiles mi-closes

  Les obus caressent le mol

  Parfum nocturne où tu reposes

  Mortification des roses

  Two time-shells A rose-pink bursting Like two unfastened breasts Offering their taut tips with insolence HE KNEW HOW TO LOVE what an epitaph

  A poet in the forest Gazes with indifference at His revolver wi
th its safety catch Roses dying of hope

  He dreams of the roses of Saadi And suddenly his head sinks down For a rose evokes for him once more The soft curve of a hip

  The air is filled with a terrible alcohol Filtered through the half-closed stars The shells caress the mellow Nocturnal fragrance in which you lie Mortification of the roses

  Visée

  A Madame René Berthier

  Chevaux couleur cerise limite des Zélandes

  Des mitrailleuses d’or coassent les légendes

  Je t’aime liberté qui veilles dans les hypogées

  Harpe aux cordes d’argent ô pluie ô ma musique

  L’invisible ennemi plaie d’argent au soleil

  Et l’avenir secret que la fusée élucide

  Entends nager le Mot poisson subtil

  Les villes tour à tour deviennent des clefs

  Le masque bleu comme met Dieu son ciel

  Guerre paisible ascèse solitude métaphysique

  Enfant aux mains coupées parmi les roses oriflammes

  Aim

  For Madame René Berthier

  Cherry coloured horses boundary of the Zealanders Golden machine guns croak out legends I love you liberty in your subterranean vigil Silver-stringed harp O rain O my music The invisible enemy a silver wound in the sunlight And the secret future illumined by the rocket Hear the Word swim subtle fish The cities one by one become keys The blue mask as God dons his sky Peaceful war asceticism metaphysical solitude A child with its hands cut off among the rose-pink banners

  La jolie rousse

  Me voici devant tous un homme plein de sens

  Connaissant la vie et de la mort ce qu’un vivant peut connaître

  Ayant éprouvé les douleurs et les joies de l’amour

  Ayant su quelquefois imposer ses idées

  Connaissant plusieurs langages

  Ayant pas mal voyagé

  Ayant vu la guerre dans l’Artillerie et l’Infanterie

  Blessé à la tête trépané sous le chloroforme

  Ayant perdu ses meilleurs amis dans l’effroyable lutte

  Je sais d’ancien et de nouveau autant qu’un homme seul pourrait des deux savoir

  Et sans m’inquiéter aujourd’hui de cette guerre

  Entre nous et pour nous mes amis

  Je juge cette longue querelle de la tradition et de l’invention

  De l’Ordre et de l’Aventure

  The Pretty Redhead

  Here I stand in the sight of all a man full of awareness Knowing life and what a living man can know of death Having experienced the pains and joys of love Having made his ideas now and then command respect Knowing several languages Having travelled quite a bit Having seen the war in Artillery and Infantry Wounded in the head trepanned under chloroform Having lost his best friends in the hideous struggle I know of the ancient and the new as much as one man alone can know of both And without troubling myself now about this war Between ourselves and for ourselves my friends I speak judgement on this long quarrel between tradition and innovation Between Order and Adventure

  Vous dont la bouche est faite à l’image de celle de Dieu

  Bouche qui est l’ordre même

  Soyez indulgents quand vous nous comparez

  A ceux qui furent la perfection de l’ordre

  Nous qui quêtons partout l’aventure

  Nous ne sommes pas vos ennemis

  Nous voulons vous donner de vastes et d’étranges domaines

  Où le mystère en fleurs s’offre à qui veut le cueillir

  Il y a là des feux nouveaux des couleurs jamais vues

  Mille phantasmes impondérables

  Auxquels il faut donner de la réalité

  Nous voulons explorer la bonté contrée énorme où tout se tait

  Il y a aussi le temps qu’on peut chasser ou faire revenir

  Pitié pour nous qui combattons toujours aux frontières

  De l’illimité et de l’avenir

  Pitié pour nos erreurs pitié pour nos péchés

  You whose mouths are made in the image of God’s mouth A mouth which is order itself Be indulgent when you compare us with those who were the perfection of order We who seek adventure everywhere

  We are not your enemies We want to give you vast and strange domains Where flowering mystery offers itself to all who wish to gather it There are new fires there colours never yet seen A thousand unfathomable phantasms To which we must give reality

  We want to explore goodness a vast land where all is mute And then there is time which can be banished or recalled Pity for us whose combat is always on the frontiers Of the limitless and of the future Pity for our errors pity for our sins

  Voici que vient l’été la saison violente

  Et ma jeunesse est morte ainsi que le printemps

  O Soleil c’est le temps de la Raison ardente

  Et j’attends

  Pour la suivre toujours la forme noble et douce

  Qu’elle prend afin que je l’aime seulement

  Elle vient et m’attire ainsi qu’un fer l’aimant

  Elle a l’aspect charmant

  D’une adorable rousse

  Ses cheveux sont d’or on dirait

  Un bel éclair qui durerait

  Ou ces flammes qui se pavanent

  Dans les roses-thé qui se fanent

  Mais riez riez de moi

  Hommes de partout surtout gens d’ici

  Car il y a tant de choses que je n’ose vous dire

  Tant de choses que vous ne me laisseriez pas dire

  Ayez pitié de moi

  Here comes the summer now the violent season And my youth has died just like the spring O Sun it is the time of burning Reason And I wait To follow it for ever the sweet and noble form She takes that I may love her alone She comes and attracts me as a magnet draws iron She has the enchanting appearance of a lovely redhead

  Her hair is golden you’d take it for A beautiful prolonged lightning flash Or those flames dancing a proud pavane among the wilting tea-roses

  But laugh laugh at me Men everywhere above all people here For there are so many things I dare not tell you So many things you would not let me say Have pity on me

  Blaise Cendrars

  (1887–1961)

  A colourful and free-wheeling figure in the modernist movement, Cendrars was born Frédéric Sauser at La Chaux-de-Fonds in Switzerland. His pseudonym, briefly Braise Cendrart and then definitively Blaise Cendrars (suggesting burning coals, ashes and art), was adopted during a ‘second birth’ in Paris in 1907, after which he claimed that city as his birthplace. A kaleidoscopic pattern of legend and anecdote is difficult to separate from biographical fact, but his unstable adolescence was marked by a patchy education, voracious reading, bouts of drinking, strife with his father, and a bedroom-window escape to a series of train journeys around Germany and eventually through Russia as far as Siberia. An association with an itinerant jewel-pedlar and a love-affair with a terminally ill Russian girl were part of that experience, but the story that he performed on stage with Chaplin during a period in London in 1907–08 is probably wishful thinking. He returned to Russia from Paris in 1910, then travelled to America in 1911.

  Surviving somehow on scant resources in New York in 1912, he suddenly produced a poem of major importance. ‘Pâques à New York’ was composed in a single night, beginning as he walked through the snow after attending a performance of Haydn’s ‘Creation’. When Cendrars returned to Paris, this long poem, in the form of Alexandrine but unpunctuated couplets, was to influence Apollinaire’s abandonment of punctuation in ‘Zone’.

  The floodgates were open for Cendrars, and in the charged creative atmosphere of 1912–14 his output was prolific. His long free verse poem ‘Prose du Transsibérien et de la petite Jeanne de France’, with its unpunctuated and restless railway-train rhythms, continues the trajectory of Laforgue and is a landmark in the development of modern verse.

  Its first edition of 150 copies was illustrated (though the word is p
erhaps inadequate) by the artist Sonia Delaunay. She and her husband Robert were close friends of Cendrars, and influenced his developing aesthetic of simultaneity. Her contribution to the ‘Prose du Transsibérien…’ consisted of strips, shapes and emotive swirls of colour both within and beside the text, complementing the words and enriching an already complex perspective (the first edition ran to more than six feet of folded text in multiple and dislocated type styles).

  He joined the Foreign Legion in 1914, and lost an arm in the Champagne offensive. Typically, he turned this event into a myth, continuing to communicate with the absent limb. In the Second World War he was to be a war correspondent, having moved away from poetry in the mid-1920s into novels and chronicles.

  Disliking the young Dadaists and Surrealists, Cendrars had left Paris in 1917 and resumed his pattern of continual travel and search for newness. He saw himself as a being in flux, always moving away from immobility in life and art, cultivating multiplicity, risk and contrast. The urge towards simultaneity of experience and observation produces poems of great visual immediacy, compression, and often a cinematic effect (he was indeed very interested in cinema, and worked for a time with Abel Gance). In words he borrowed from the Delaunays, his perception has its ‘windows open’ to an experience which is captured in a chopped, elastic, intense style. The ephemeral is not synthesized, but enjoyed for its own sake. This dynamic spontaneity, however, with its spatial and temporal freedom, is balanced by a paradoxical nostalgia that preserves an element of poignant lyricism.

  The act of writing itself, implying stasis and confinement and the fixing of experience, is of course problematic for such an artist, and full of tension. For Cendrars writing is also like burning in a fire: ‘To write is to consume oneself… Writing is a fire that lifts up a great confusion of ideas and incinerates groups of images before reducing them to crackling embers and falling ashes. But the spontaneity of the fire remains mysterious. To write is to burn alive, but is also to be reborn from ashes.’

 

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