TRANSLATIONS/INTERPRETATIONS BY SUSAN OSTERMAN
This section will be used to feature translations, interpretations, and poetic equivalents by Susan Osterman. For more on Susan, including her literary biography, see Poetry By Susan Osterman.
À la
musique
ARTHUR RIMBAUD
PLACE
DE LA GARE, À CHARLEVILLE
Sur la
place taillée en mesquines pelouses,
Square où tout est correct, les arbres et les fleurs,
Tous les bourgeois poussifs qu'étranglent les chaleurs
Portent, les jeudis soirs, leurs bêtises jalouses.
__L'orchestre militaire, au milieu du jardin,
Balance ses schakos dans la Valse des fifres:
__Autour, aux premiers rangs, parade le gandin;
Le notaire pend à ses breloques à chiffres.
Des rentiers à lorngnons soulignent tous les couacs:
Les gros bureaux bouffis traînent leurs grosses dames
Auprès desquelles vont, officieux cornacs,
Celles don't les volant ont des airs de réclames;
Sur les bancs verts, des clubs d'épiciers retraités
Qui tisonnent le sable avec leur canne à pomme,
Fort sérieusement discutent les traités
Puis prisent en argent, et reprennent: "En somme!…."
Epatant sur son banc les rondeurs de ses reins,
Un bourgeois à boutons clairs, bedaine flamande,
Savoure son onnaing d'où le tabac par brins
Déborde---vous savez, c'est de la contrebande; ---
Le long des gazons verts ricanent les voyons;
Et, rendus amoureux par le chant des trombones,
Très naifs, et fumant des roses, les piopious
Caressent les bébés pour enjôler les bonnes….
__Moi, je suis, débraillé comme un étudiant,
Sous les marronniers verts les alertes fillettes:
Elle le savent bien; et tournent en riant,
Vers moi, leurs yeux tout pleins de choses indiscrètes/
Je ne dis pas un mot: je regarde toujours
La chair de leurs cous blancs brodés de mèches folles:
Je suis, sous le corsage et les frêles atours,
Le dos divin après la courbe des épaules.
J'ai bientôt déniché la bottine, le bas….
---Je reconstruis les corps, brûlé de belles fièvres.
Elles me trouvent drôle et se parlent tout bas . . .
---Et mes désirs brutaux s'accrochent à leurs lèvres. . .
MUSIC PLAY ALWAYS
RAILWAY STATION AT CHARLEVILLE
À la musique A. Rimbaud
BIO-INTERPRETATION BY SUSAN OSTERMAN
The public square is cut into stingy plots of grass,
The trees and flowers conform to standards; they're good citizens,
The wheezy bourgeois are trying to do the same, o how they try!
But their baggage is jealousy & jealousy's a one trick pony!
The military band, in the middle of the garden of my mind,
Swings their shakos in The Waltz of Flutes:
Around music the dandies ever strut the first row,
The notary hangs from his own watch-fob, the slob;
Men of private means shit too but in pince-nez without the music;
Men from huge desks and computers and bright buttons and knobs
& fat-bellied wives simulating fat announcements
Wives whose flounces are like elephants
Is there any difference but elephants are innocents
Fat husbands and wives are evidence of the data
Of stuffing continual food down empty mouths and hungry souls
And so proud of husbands with pricey onnaing pipes
Tobacco hanging out but we all know it's smuggled goods
Spreading round rumps across benches not made for the load;
Bragging again those self-satisfied onnaing pipe-smokers; hey, guess what?
Paul Verlaine, crapulous bohemian and love of my life;
I, Arthur Rimbaud and you who love like tigers
We, too, could we avoid the jungle,
Rhymers of no talent and the literary cannibals?
But, alas, we stray---back to the railway station
Hoodlums stray sneering at everyone,
They suck on roses: this is my poetry
No one can erase images & still they suck on roses,
Dressed as shabbily as a student, I follow
Under green chestnut trees, my soft green Ardennes
birthplace-soft green winds from which I suck in the breath of nature
Taking the countryside for granted, wishing I were in Paris
I, say not a word: I keep watch,
I follow, under the bodice and scanty clothes
Forgive me Paul, I, like you lust for women
I watch the divine back below the curves which men don't have
Paul, my artistic romantic brother/lover
I like you also burn with desire reconstructing their bodies
Like any man, and my fierce desires fasten on their lips…
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