Poetry. Translated from the French by Noelle Kocot. "...I have the clearness of the moon, / And for friends I have amorous vagabonds with no money." A limited-edition, hand-sewn volume of poet Noelle Kocot's translations of some of the poems of Tristan Corbière (1845-1875), the young French poet whose only book, Les Amours jaunes, was largely ignored until the Symbolist poet Paul Verlaine wrote about him a decade after his untimely death. Marked by his use of irony and a distinctive local idiom, Tristan Corbière's work is a cornerstone of modern French poetry, and has been influential to English and American modernists such as Pound and Eliot.
Author City: Morlaix FRA
Tristan Corbière (1845-1875), was born in Coat-Congar, Ploujean, in northwest France. The young poet's only book, Les Amours jaunes, was largely ignored until the Symbolist poet Paul Verlaine wrote about him a decade after his untimely death. Marked by his use of irony and a distinctive local idiom, Corbière's work is a cornerstone of modern French poetry, and has been influential to English and American modernists such as Pound and Eliot.
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Justin Sider @ MAKE
Paris Nocturne
It’s the sea, calm flat. And the big tide
With a far-off roar has gone out...
The wave comes back rolling in its noise.
Can you hear the night crabs scraping their claws?
It’s the dried up Styx: the ragpicker Diogenes,
Lantern in hand, comes rudely.
Along the black gutters, the perverse poets
Angle, their hollow skulls hold worms for bait.
It’s a field: for gleaning dirty lint,
For slaughtering a flock of hideous shrews;
The gutter rabbit in watch for rodents
Flees the sons of Bondy, harvesters of night.
It’s death: the policeman lies dead—While love
Takes a nap, groping the flesh with its heavy hand
Where an extinguished kiss leaves a red splotch.
The hour is alone. Listen: not a dream stirs.
It’s life: listen, the living spring sings
The eternal song over the sticky earth
Of a sea god stretching his limbs nude and green
On the bed of the Morgue...and his big eyes are open.