Jean Cocteau
The Bronze Horseman
(text)
August 1958
for Fabrizio Cleriu
Like your eyebrow
above the eye another
funeral arch or gondola in mourning
gloriously rears itself
borne by some black Narcissus
deftly
we saw some
with legs of Carpaccio
of petunias on the tip
of a velvet wolf with empty eyes
women dip their dreamy hand
between stems of dead flowers
in a vase of stagnant water
long scarlet carpets
gold of the fringes towards that strange
marble water with angel’s feet
all day long It was pigeon flight
but at night the illustrious statue
* leaves its horse and kills
the singing woman gone silent.
N.B. The effect of the final lines relies on a verbal
pun between ‘tue’ (third person singular of 'tuer’ - to
kill) and ‘tue’ (past participle of ‘taire’ — to be
silent) rhyming with ‘statue’. This is impossible to
render in English but should be acknowledged nevertheless.
pun between ‘tue’ (third person singular of 'tuer’ - to
kill) and ‘tue’ (past participle of ‘taire’ — to be
silent) rhyming with ‘statue’. This is impossible to
render in English but should be acknowledged nevertheless.
Translated by Tony Montague
Page(s) 28
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The