Members
Poems
keki
Jan 2011
We reflect on objects and people that bring to to dead zone but we some times we need to get pass the present and look more to the futur
Michael R Burch
Dec 2021
These are my modern English translations of sonnets by the French poet Stephane Mallarme.
The Tomb of Edgar Poe
by Stéphane Mallarmé
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Transformed into himself by Death, at last,
the Bard unsheathed his Art’s recondite blade
to duel with dullards, blind & undismayed,
who’d never heard his ardent Voice, aghast!
Like dark Medusan demons of the past
who’d failed to heed such high, angelic words,
men called him bendered, his ideas absurd,
discounting all the warlock’s spells he’d cast.
The wars of heaven and hell? Earth’s senseless grief?
Can sculptors carve from myths a bas-relief
to illuminate the sepulcher of Poe?
No, let us set in granite, here below,
a limit and a block on this disaster:
this Blasphemy, to not acknowledge a Master!
The original French poem appears after the translations
"Le Cygne" ("The Swan")
by Stéphane Mallarmé
this untitled poem is also called Mallarmé's "White Sonnet"
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
The virginal, the vivid, the vivacious day:
can its brilliance be broken by a wild wing-blow
delivered to this glacial lake
whose frozen ice-falls impede flight? No.
In past reflections on its thoughts today
the Swan remembers freedom, but can’t make
a song from its surroundings, only take
on the winter's ghostly hue of snow.
In the Swan's white agony its bared neck lies
within a guillotine its sense denies.
Slowly being frozen to its inner being,
the body ignores the phantom spirit fleeing...
Cold contempt for its captor
is of no use to the raptor.
Le tombeau d’Edgar Poe
by Stéphane Mallarmé
Tel qu’en Lui-même enfin l’éternité le change,
Le Poète suscite avec un glaive nu
Son siècle épouvanté de n’avoir pas connu
Que la mort triomphait dans cette voix étrange!
Eux, comme un vil sursaut d’hydre oyant jadis l’ange
Donner un sens plus pur aux mots de la tribu,
Proclamèrent très haut le sortilège bu
Dans le flot sans honneur de quelque noir mélange.
Du sol et de la nue hostiles, ô grief!
Si notre idée avec ne sculpte un bas-relief
Dont la tombe de Poe éblouissante s’orne
Calme bloc ici-bas chu d’un désastre obscur
Que ce granit du moins montre à jamais sa borne
Aux noirs vols du Blasphème épars dans le futur.
Le Cygne
by Stéphane Mallarmé
Le vierge, le vivace et le bel aujourd'hui
Va-t-il nous déchirer avec un coup d'aile ivre
Ce lac dur oublié que hante sous le givre
Le transparent glacier des vols qui n'ont pas fui !
Un cygne d'autrefois se souvient que c'est lui
Magnifique mais qui sans espoir se délivre
Pour n'avoir pas chanté la région où vivre
Quand du stérile hiver a resplendi l'ennui.
Tout son col secouera cette blanche agonie
Par l'espace infligée à l'oiseau qui le nie,
Mais non l'horreur du sol où le plumage est pris.
Fantôme qu'à ce lieu son pur éclat assigne,
Il s'immobilise au songe froid de mépris
Que vêt parmi l'exil inutile le Cygne.
Stephane Mallarme was a major French poet and one of the leading French symbolist poets.
Keywords/Tags: Stephane Mallarme, France, French poet, symbolism, symbolist, symbolic, poetry, Edgar Allan Poe, grave, tomb, sepulcher, memorial, elegy, eulogy, epitaph, sonnet
The Tomb of Edgar Poe
by Stéphane Mallarmé
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Transformed into himself by Death, at last,
the Bard unsheathed his Art’s recondite blade
to duel with dullards, blind & undismayed,
who’d never heard his ardent Voice, aghast!
Like dark Medusan demons of the past
who’d failed to heed such high, angelic words,
men called him bendered, his ideas absurd,
discounting all the warlock’s spells he’d cast.
The wars of heaven and hell? Earth’s senseless grief?
Can sculptors carve from myths a bas-relief
to illuminate the sepulcher of Poe?
No, let us set in granite, here below,
a limit and a block on this disaster:
this Blasphemy, to not acknowledge a Master!
The original French poem appears after the translations
"Le Cygne" ("The Swan")
by Stéphane Mallarmé
this untitled poem is also called Mallarmé's "White Sonnet"
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
The virginal, the vivid, the vivacious day:
can its brilliance be broken by a wild wing-blow
delivered to this glacial lake
whose frozen ice-falls impede flight? No.
In past reflections on its thoughts today
the Swan remembers freedom, but can’t make
a song from its surroundings, only take
on the winter's ghostly hue of snow.
In the Swan's white agony its bared neck lies
within a guillotine its sense denies.
Slowly being frozen to its inner being,
the body ignores the phantom spirit fleeing...
Cold contempt for its captor
is of no use to the raptor.
Le tombeau d’Edgar Poe
by Stéphane Mallarmé
Tel qu’en Lui-même enfin l’éternité le change,
Le Poète suscite avec un glaive nu
Son siècle épouvanté de n’avoir pas connu
Que la mort triomphait dans cette voix étrange!
Eux, comme un vil sursaut d’hydre oyant jadis l’ange
Donner un sens plus pur aux mots de la tribu,
Proclamèrent très haut le sortilège bu
Dans le flot sans honneur de quelque noir mélange.
Du sol et de la nue hostiles, ô grief!
Si notre idée avec ne sculpte un bas-relief
Dont la tombe de Poe éblouissante s’orne
Calme bloc ici-bas chu d’un désastre obscur
Que ce granit du moins montre à jamais sa borne
Aux noirs vols du Blasphème épars dans le futur.
Le Cygne
by Stéphane Mallarmé
Le vierge, le vivace et le bel aujourd'hui
Va-t-il nous déchirer avec un coup d'aile ivre
Ce lac dur oublié que hante sous le givre
Le transparent glacier des vols qui n'ont pas fui !
Un cygne d'autrefois se souvient que c'est lui
Magnifique mais qui sans espoir se délivre
Pour n'avoir pas chanté la région où vivre
Quand du stérile hiver a resplendi l'ennui.
Tout son col secouera cette blanche agonie
Par l'espace infligée à l'oiseau qui le nie,
Mais non l'horreur du sol où le plumage est pris.
Fantôme qu'à ce lieu son pur éclat assigne,
Il s'immobilise au songe froid de mépris
Que vêt parmi l'exil inutile le Cygne.
Stephane Mallarme was a major French poet and one of the leading French symbolist poets.
Keywords/Tags: Stephane Mallarme, France, French poet, symbolism, symbolist, symbolic, poetry, Edgar Allan Poe, grave, tomb, sepulcher, memorial, elegy, eulogy, epitaph, sonnet
Christopher Lafleur May 2014
Praying
Christopher Lafleur
May 2014
Praying iv'e learnt my lesson
Now that they've starved me of attention
My momma used to say i was such a blessing
Till i grew up, i blew up
Now im locked up, being taught a lesson
All these drugs iv'e done left deep scars
The only cure was to deprive me of my freedom
Now my insides are healing, behind bars
Prayng iv'e learnt my lesson
Unless this deprivations just a vacation
to depress a life of inevitable desperation
a temporary suppresion of a shamless existance
My mother prays i learnt a lesson
She prays for a better person
A person with a brighter futur
A futur full of succession, accomplishing the unexpected
I dont know what she is expecting
The bar is set so high
i will restart when i escape these bars im behind
My father prays I lead a better life
The choices are mine, he can only give advice
Suggest to me a cleaner life
Tell me to choose a righteous wife
Hope I find happiness, adivse me to get rich
He prays i lead a simple life
He reminds me how lifes a test and you have to take it
As we saty awake and reminise of his mistakes
He prays i learnt from his misfortune
And commemorate his story
I pray i learnt my leasson
Get released into futur blessings
Now that they've starved me of attention
My momma used to say i was such a blessing
Till i grew up, i blew up
Now im locked up, being taught a lesson
All these drugs iv'e done left deep scars
The only cure was to deprive me of my freedom
Now my insides are healing, behind bars
Prayng iv'e learnt my lesson
Unless this deprivations just a vacation
to depress a life of inevitable desperation
a temporary suppresion of a shamless existance
My mother prays i learnt a lesson
She prays for a better person
A person with a brighter futur
A futur full of succession, accomplishing the unexpected
I dont know what she is expecting
The bar is set so high
i will restart when i escape these bars im behind
My father prays I lead a better life
The choices are mine, he can only give advice
Suggest to me a cleaner life
Tell me to choose a righteous wife
Hope I find happiness, adivse me to get rich
He prays i lead a simple life
He reminds me how lifes a test and you have to take it
As we saty awake and reminise of his mistakes
He prays i learnt from his misfortune
And commemorate his story
I pray i learnt my leasson
Get released into futur blessings