Poets Translate Poets: A Hudson Review Anthology (14 page)

despoilèd by my vanity

that vies with suns, tacit beneath

the fl ower-sparkle, now relate

how here I cut the hollow reeds

that talent tames; when, on pale gold

of distant greens that dedicate

their vine to fountains, undulates

an animal whiteness in repose:

and how at sound of slow prelude

with which the pipes fi rst come to life

this fl ight of swans, no! naiads fl ees

or plunges . . .

Limp in the tawny hour

all is burning and shows no trace

by what art those too many brides

longed-for by him who seeks the
A

all at once decamped; then shall I wake

to the primal fi re, alone and straight,

beneath an ancient surge of light,

and one of all of you, lilies!

by strength of my simplicity.

Other than the soft nothingness

their lips made rumor of, the kiss,

which gives assurance in low tones

of the two perfi dious ones,

my breast, immaculate of proof,

attests an enigmatic bite,

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imputed to some august tooth;

leave it! such mystery made choice

of confi dant: the vast twinned reed—

beneath blue sky we give it voice:

diverting to itself the cheek’s

turmoil, it dreams, in a long solo,

that we amused the beauty here—

about by false bewilderments

between it and our naive song;

dreams too that from the usual dream

of back or fl awless fl ank traced by

my shuttered glances, it makes fade,

tempered to love’s own pitch, a vain,

monotonous, sonorous line.

Oh instrument of fl ights, try then,

cunning Syrinx, to bloom again

by lakes where you await me! I,

proud of my murmur, shall discourse

at length of goddesses; and by

idolatries warmly portrayed

remove more cinctures from their shades:

thus, when from grapes their clarity

I suck, to banish a regret

defl ected by my strategy,

laughing, I raise the cluster high

and empty to the summer sky,

and breathing into its bright skins,

craving the grace of drunkenness,

I gaze them through till night begins.

Oh nymphs, let us once more expand

various memories.
My eye,

piercing the reeds, darted at each

immortal neck-and-shoulders, which

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submerged its burning in the wave

with a cry of rage to the forest sky;

and the splendid shower of their hair

in shimmering limpidities,

oh jewels, vanishes! I run;

when, at my feet, all interlaced

(bruised by the languor which they taste

of this sickness of being two),

I come upon them where they sleep

amid their own chance arms alone;

and seizing them, together still

entwined, I fl y to this massed bloom—

detested by the frivolous shade—

of roses draining all perfume

in the sun’s heat; where our frisk play

may mirror the consumèd day.

I worship you, oh wrath of virgins,

savage joy of the sacred burden

sliding its nakedness to fl ee

my lips that drink, all fi ery,—

like tremor of a lightning-fl ash!—

the secret terror of the fl esh:

from feet of the inhuman one

to her shy sister’s heart, who is

forsaken at the instant by

an innocence, moist with wild tears

or humors of a brighter cheer.

My crime is, that in gaiety

of vanquishing these traitor fears

I parted the disheveled tuft

of kisses which the gods had kept

so closely mingled; for I scarce

moved to conceal a burning laugh

beneath glad sinuosities

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of one alone (holding the child,

naive and never blushing, by

a single fi nger, that her white-

swan candor might take tinge of shame

from kindling of her sister’s fl ame:)

when from my arms, that are undone

by obscure passings, this my prey

for ever thankless slips away

unpitying the sob which still

intoxicated me.

Ah well!

Others will draw me towards joy,

their tresses knotted to my brow’s

twin horns: you know, my passion, how

each pomegranate, purple now

and fully ripened, bursts—and hums

with bees; and our blood, taking fi re

from her who will possess it, fl ows

for the timeless swarm of all desire.

At the hour when this wood is tinged

with ash and gold, a festival

fl ares up in the extinguished leaves:

Etna! ’tis on your slopes, visited

by Venus setting down her heels

artless upon your lava, when

a solemn slumber thunders, or

the fl ame expires.

I hold the queen!

Oh certain punishment . . .

But no,

the spirit empty of words, and

this weighed-down body late succumb

to the proud silence of mid-day;

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no more—lying on the parched sand,

forgetful of the blasphemy,

I must sleep, in my chosen way,

wide-mouthed to the wine-fostering sun!

Couple, farewell; I soon shall see

the shade wherein you merged as one.

Frederick Morgan, 1953

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Paul Va léry
(1871–1945)

Th

e Birth of Venus

Out of the mothering deep, still cold and sweating,

At the storm-beaten threshold, here the fl esh

Vomited to the sunlight by the bitter wash,

Tears itself free from the diamond fretting.

Her smile forms, slips where the white arm lies,

Weeps down a bruised shoulder’s rosiness,

Pure treasure of the watery Th

etis,

And her hair runs a shiver down her thighs.

Th

e pebbles, spattered, tossed aside—so agile

Her course—crumble a thirsty sound, and fragile

Sands drink as they kiss her childlike bounds;

Vague or perfi dious, she has a thousand glances;

Her fl ashing eye, the lightning’s awe compounds

With smiling sea, and the waves’ faithless dances.

Bather

Like fruit her naked fl esh bathes in a pool

(Blue in the trembling gardens) but over the brim

Th

e gold head shines, detaching the hair’s coil,

Strong as a casque, cut off at the throat by a tomb.

Beauty forced open by the rose and the comb!

Born from the mirror itself where her jewels steep—

Bizarre broken fi res whose hard cluster bites

Her ear given up to naked words and the soft deep.

A rippling arm drowns in the water’s hollow

Because of a fl ower’s shadow plucked in vain,

Ravels, washes, dreams toward delight to follow,

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While the other, curved simply under the lovely sky,

Moistening her hair’s luxuriant fold,

Catches a drunken insect’s fl ight in gold.

In Sleeping Beauty’s Wood

Th

e princess, in a palace of pure rose,

Sleeps under whispers changing shadow brings;

A word on the bright mouth, half-uttered, shows

When the lost birds peck at her golden rings.

She does not hear the raindrops as they fall,

Tinkling a far-off century’s lost praise,

Nor hears above the wood a wind’s fl ute call

Tearing across the hunting horn’s far phrase.

Let the long echo give back to sleep the waking,

Always, O more resembling the soft vine

Th

at balances and on your sealed eyes beats.

So close to your cheek, and slowly, the blown rose

Will never dissipate those delicate pleats

Secretly sensitive to light’s falling rays.

Caesar

Caesar, calm Caesar, standing on all that is,

Fists clenched in his beard, and somber eye informed

By eagles and the sunset’s combat stormed,

Your heart swells, and feels itself all-powerful cause.

Vainly the lake quivers and laps its bed of rose;

Vainly the young wheat shines like precious metal;

You harden and knot in the tension of the will

Order, at last forcing your mouth to unclose.

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Enormous world, beyond horizon’s end,

Th

e Empire waits for lightning, the decree, the brand

Which will change evening to a furious dawn.

Happy on the waters, rocked by chance apart,

A fi sherman sings and, indolent, fl oats on,

Ignorant of the bolt gathering in Caesar’s heart.

Louise Bogan and May Sarton, 1959

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Guill aum e A pollin a ir e
(1880–1918)

Church Bells

O my dark-headed gypsy boy

You hear how the bells go

We made the two-backed beast of love

Th

inking no one would know

But all the bells around the town

Could see our naked fun

And from their perch in steeple-tops

Are telling everyone

Tomorrow Cyprian and Mark

Lawrence upon his grill

Th

e girl who runs the pastry shop

And my own cousin Jill

Will smile whenever I go by

I won’t know where to hide

And you’ll be gone And I shall cry

And wish that I were dead.

Anthony Hecht, 1961

Gu i l l au m e A p ol l i na i r e
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Va lery L a r baud
(1881–1957)

Th

ese Sounds and Th

is Movement

Ode

Lend me your great noise, your great smooth speed,

Your nocturnal gliding across lighted Europe,

O train de luxe! and the agonizing music

Th

at hums along your corridors of gilded leather,

While behind lacquered doors with latches of heavy copper

Sleep the millionaires.

I wander through your corridors singing

And I follow your course toward Vienna and Budapest,

Mingling my voice with your hundred thousand voices,

O Harmonica-Zug!

I felt for the fi rst time all the sweetness of life

In a compartment of the North Express between Wirballen and Pskow.

We were gliding by meadows where shepherds

At the foot of groups of great trees like hills

Were clothed in raw and dirty sheepskin . . .

(Eight o’clock on an autumn morning, and the beautiful singer

With violet eyes was singing in the next compartment.)

And you, great squares across which I have seen Siberia as it passed and the

hills of Samnium,

Harsh, unfl owering Castille, and the sea of Marmara under a warm rain!

Lend me, O Orient Express, South-Brenner-Bahn, lend me

Your miraculous deep sounds and

Your vibrant voices like fi rst strings;

Lend me the light and easy breathing

Of tall, slender locomotives with such unconstrained

Movements, the express locomotives

Eff ortlessly preceding four yellow coaches with gold lettering

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In the mountainous solitudes of Serbia,

And, further away, crossing Bulgaria with all its roses . . .

Ah! these sounds and this movement

Must enter my poems and speak

For my life that has no speech, my life

Like a child’s that does not want to know anything, only

To hope eternally for vague things.

Images

I

One day at Kharkov, in a densely populated area,

(O that Meridional Russia where all the women

With white shawls on their heads look like Madonnas!),

I saw a young woman coming from the fountain

Carrying, as they do, just as in the time of Ovid,

Two buckets suspended from the ends of a piece of wood

Balanced on her neck and shoulders.

And I saw a child in rags approach and speak to her.