Of Winter, Desolation and Laughter...
[Image : Nicolai Kalmakoff (1873 - 1955), ‘The Apparition’ (undated)]
Winter is the great destroyer. Even Autumn cannot equal her in sheer withering power. For the following Spring to be born, the previous summer must be utterly annihilated; mercilessly. In her, Nature is at her most unsentimental. But even Winter has her seductive charms. Her cold mouth kisses every single branch and stone. Her lascivious and cold saliva hangs pendulously in every icicle. She can give only the coldest of embraces, yet in her frigid glance lay many a wanton mystery...
Sonnet d’Hiver
Le ciel est envahi d’une tristesse grise
Où frissonne un reflet mourant de soleil froid ;
La bise au fond des parcs gémit, la peur s’accroît,
Le marbre triomphal blanc de givre se brise.
Le rêve est désolé de brume toujours grise,
Le souvenir y laisse à peine un rayon froid ;
En les âmes d’hiver, dont la neige s’accroît,
L’orgueil d’un cher empire évanoui se brise.
Pleuré longtemps par les rameaux crispés de froid
Dans les bosquets voilés d’une dentelle grise
Un funèbre tapis de pourpre et d’or s’accroît.
Au glas du vent, la fleur d’illusion se brise,
Et, comme elle se meurt, dans l’atmosphère grise
Des yeux mystérieux luisent d’un rire froid.
Édouard Dubus, « Les Violons sont Partis », 1892.
Winter Sonnet
The sky is invaded by a gray sadness
Where shivers the dying reflection of a cold sun;
The North Wind at the bottom of the parks moans, the fear increases,
The white triumphal marble of frost shatters.
The dream is desolate with an ever gray mist,
There, memory hardly let's through a single cold ray;
In the souls of winter, whose snow increases,
The pride of a beloved empire breaks itself apart.
Wept for a long time by the branches clenched with cold
In the groves veiled with a gray lace
A funereal carpet of purple and gold grows.
At the knell of wind, the flower of illusion breaks,
And, as it kills itself, in the gray atmosphere,
Some mysterious eyes gleam with a cold laughter.
Édouard Dubus, ‘Les Violons sont Partis’ ('The Violins have Gone'), 1892.
[Traduction Anglaise : Raymond E. André III, 2011]
Winter is the great destroyer. Even Autumn cannot equal her in sheer withering power. For the following Spring to be born, the previous summer must be utterly annihilated; mercilessly. In her, Nature is at her most unsentimental. But even Winter has her seductive charms. Her cold mouth kisses every single branch and stone. Her lascivious and cold saliva hangs pendulously in every icicle. She can give only the coldest of embraces, yet in her frigid glance lay many a wanton mystery...
Sonnet d’Hiver
Le ciel est envahi d’une tristesse grise
Où frissonne un reflet mourant de soleil froid ;
La bise au fond des parcs gémit, la peur s’accroît,
Le marbre triomphal blanc de givre se brise.
Le rêve est désolé de brume toujours grise,
Le souvenir y laisse à peine un rayon froid ;
En les âmes d’hiver, dont la neige s’accroît,
L’orgueil d’un cher empire évanoui se brise.
Pleuré longtemps par les rameaux crispés de froid
Dans les bosquets voilés d’une dentelle grise
Un funèbre tapis de pourpre et d’or s’accroît.
Au glas du vent, la fleur d’illusion se brise,
Et, comme elle se meurt, dans l’atmosphère grise
Des yeux mystérieux luisent d’un rire froid.
Édouard Dubus, « Les Violons sont Partis », 1892.
Winter Sonnet
The sky is invaded by a gray sadness
Where shivers the dying reflection of a cold sun;
The North Wind at the bottom of the parks moans, the fear increases,
The white triumphal marble of frost shatters.
The dream is desolate with an ever gray mist,
There, memory hardly let's through a single cold ray;
In the souls of winter, whose snow increases,
The pride of a beloved empire breaks itself apart.
Wept for a long time by the branches clenched with cold
In the groves veiled with a gray lace
A funereal carpet of purple and gold grows.
At the knell of wind, the flower of illusion breaks,
And, as it kills itself, in the gray atmosphere,
Some mysterious eyes gleam with a cold laughter.
Édouard Dubus, ‘Les Violons sont Partis’ ('The Violins have Gone'), 1892.
[Traduction Anglaise : Raymond E. André III, 2011]