the cabinet
to mme mauté de fleurville*
I've had to have a very quick eye, a finely tuned ear, keen
attention,
to discover the mystery of the furniture, to penetrate the
perspectives of marquetry, to reach the imaginary world through
the tiny mirrors.
But at last I caught sight of the secret festivity, heard the
minute minuets, surprised the complicated intrigues woven within
the cabinet.
One opens the flaps, sees a sort of salon for insects, observes
the white, brown and black tiling in magnified perspective.
A mirror in the middle, a mirror on the right, a mirror on the
left, like the doors in the more symmetrical farces. Really these
mirrors are doors opening upon the imaginary.
Yet - a clearly unusual solitude, a neatness whose purpose
one seeks in this unpeopled salon, a motiveless luxury for an
interior where only night used to rule.
You are taken in by that, you tell yourself "it's a piece of
furniture, that's all", you think that behind the mirrors there's
nothing other than the reflection of what is presented to them.
Insinuations that come from somewhere, lies whispered to
our reason by deliberate policy, errors in which we have certain
interest I do not need to define.
Still, I no longer want to be cagey in that respect, I don't
care what might happen, I'm not worried by imagined resentments.
When the cabinet is closed up, when the intruder's ear is
stopped by sleep or filled with external noises, when men's
thought weighs heavy upon some definite object.
Strange scenes then unfold within the salon of the cabinet;
a few persons of unusual stature and presence emerge from the
tiny mirrors; certain groups, illuminated by dim gleams, move
about in these magnified perspectives.
From the depths of the marquetry, from behind the counterfeit
colonnades, from the far ends of false corridors contrived on the
reverse of the folding flaps,
Clad in antiquated clothes, advance - with quivering footsteps
and for a festival of an extra-terrestrial calendar -
Dandies of a dream era, young girls seeking an established place
in this society of reflections, and finally the elderly parents, paunchy diplomats and acned dowagers.
On the wall of polished wood, hung who knows how, the
candelabra light up. At the centre of the room, hanging from the
non-existent ceiling, glitters a chandelier glutted with pink candles
thick and long as snails' horns. In the unexpected hearths fires blaze
like glowworms.
Who put these armchairs here, deep as hazel-nut shells and
ranged in a circle, these tables overloaded with ethereal refreshments or microscopic gaming-chips, these sumptuous curtains - heavy as
spider-webs?
But the dance begins. The orchestra, which one would take to
be composed of may-bugs, emits its notes, imperceptible cracklings
and whistlings. The young people join hands and bow and curtsey
to one another.
Perhaps even some kisses of fancied love are exchanged on the
sly, mindless smiles hide behind fans made of flies' wings, faded
flowers on bodices are requested and given as tokens of mutual
indifference.
How long will it last? What conversations are exchanged during
these festivities? Where does this world without substance go, after
the party?
One can't tell.
Because if one opens the cabinet, the lights and fires go out;
the guests, dandies, coquettes, and elderly parents disappear
helter-skelter, careless of their dignity, into mirrors, corridors and
colonnades; the armchairs the tables and the curtains vanish.
And the salon remains empty, silent and tidy;
So everybody says of it "it's a piece of furniture, marquetry
and that's all", without suspecting that immediately the gaze is
averted.
Cunning little faces risk coming out of symmetrical mirrors,
from behind inlaid columns, from the far ends of false corridors.
And it takes a particularly practised look, close and quick, to
surprise them as they retire within these magnified perspectives,
whenever they seek refuge in the imaginary depths of the tiny
mirrors, at the moment when they return to the unreal hiding-places
of the polished wood.
* verlaine's mother-in-law
from le coffret de santal (1873)
Translated by Alexis Lykiard
Page(s) 51-53
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