The Bestiary: or Orpheus’s Procession
(Le Bestiaire ou Cortège d’Orphée)
Orpheus
Admire the vital power
And nobility of line:
It’s the voice that the light made us understand here
That Hermes Trismegistus writes of in Pimander.
The Tortoise
From magic Thrace, O delerium!
My sure fingers sound the strings.
The creatures pass to the sounds
Of my tortoise, and the songs I sing.
The Horse
My harsh dreams knew the riding of you
My gold-charioted fate will be your lovely car
That for reins will hold tight to frenzy,
My verses, the patterns of all poetry.
The Tibetan Goat
The fleece of this goat and even
That gold one which cost such pain
To Jason’s not worth a sou towards
The tresses with which I’m taken.
The Serpent
You set yourself against beauty.
And how many women have been
victims of your cruelty!
Eve, Eurydice, Cleopatra:
I know three or four more after.
The Cat
I wish there to be in my house:
A woman possessing reason,
A cat among books passing by,
Friends for every season
Lacking whom I’m barely alive.
[...] Read more
poem by Guillaume Apollinaire
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