Guy Goffette
Construction Site of the Elegy II
II
(And to think that for us, spring
was married beneath the flowering hawthorn,
that everything was decked out for a one-way
trip to the heart of the grove:
the red roofs, the blued spine
of the hills, and the trees already
crossing their arms against the sky
as if nothing ever again
would change, despite the rain,
the wind, the hail, and the distress
shared by the musician who in the midst
of an opera doubts that he likes music
and still must hear it, must put up with it
and who remains seated nonetheless
among the elegy’s accessories
like those statues at the far end of the park
knitting silence for the exhausted gods.
(And to think that for us, spring
was married beneath the flowering hawthorn,
that everything was decked out for a one-way
trip to the heart of the grove:
the red roofs, the blued spine
of the hills, and the trees already
crossing their arms against the sky
as if nothing ever again
would change, despite the rain,
the wind, the hail, and the distress
shared by the musician who in the midst
of an opera doubts that he likes music
and still must hear it, must put up with it
and who remains seated nonetheless
among the elegy’s accessories
like those statues at the far end of the park
knitting silence for the exhausted gods.
Translated by Marilyn Hacker
Page(s) 106
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