End of Summer and fading roses . . .
Oh, I’m sad to see summer waning. Although it’s still hot here—the light is going, the days are shorter and there are jackets and boots in store windows. It’s not to say that autumn isn’t lovely too—I look forward to cooler days, wearing sweaters and the leaves turning (even though there’s only a few trees whose leaves turn to colors here in LA). But there’s something bittersweet about the end of summer. Like old roses fading. And so I found this poem by French poet Albert Samain (translated by Kevin Germain) — that to me echoes these feelings. . .
I DREAM OF SOFT VERSES AND INTIMATE WARBLINGS —
I dream of soft verses and intimate warblings,
Of verses that brush the heart as wings might do,
Of blonde verses whose liquid meanings untie,
Below the wake’s flow, from Ophelia’s long hair,
Of verses of silence without rhythm or plot
Where soundlessly rhymes slip past like oars,
Of verses extenuated in old fabrics,
Impalpable, like sounds or clouds,
Of fall evening verses bewitching the hours,
With feminine rituals in minor key syllables,
Of amourous night verses enerved by verbena,
Where the spirits’ sensing, exquisitely – barely – a caress.
Where the depths of bathed nerves in waves of coaxing,
Dies endlessly in feline swoons,
Like fragrencies dissloved in secret tepidities,
Gold viols, and pianissim’ amorose….
I dream of soft verses fading like roses.
Edited: August 28th, 2009
