Casting light on the subject

Shops give me the willies, these days. Good places to catch your death. Supermarkets are dead to me. But if you go into Majestic Wine Warehouse the moment they open, you'll outnumber the staff. And as you browse, an assistant will glide up murmuring advice if you want it.

I chose stuff I'd never heard of for the fun of it. I was in a French mood and I liked the label. After being constructively murmured at, of course.

While in a French mood, and having been chided for missing Poetry Day, how's this, even if a little over the top?

Je suis le Ténébreux, - le Veuf, - l'Inconsolé,
Le Prince d'Aquitaine à la Tour abolie :
Ma seule Etoile est morte, - et mon luth constellé
Porte le Soleil noir de la Mélancolie.

Dans la nuit du Tombeau, Toi qui m'as consolé,
Rends-moi le Pausilippe et la mer d'Italie,
La fleur qui plaisait tant à mon coeur désolé,
Et la treille où le Pampre à la Rose s'allie.

Suis-je Amour ou Phébus ?... Lusignan ou Biron ?
Mon front est rouge encor du baiser de la Reine ;
J'ai rêvé dans la Grotte où nage la sirène...

Et j'ai deux fois vainqueur traversé l'Achéron :
Modulant tour à tour sur la lyre d'Orphée
Les soupirs de la Sainte et les cris de la Fée.


I recited this from memory in a revue in the sixties. The poet, Gérard de Nerval, was a bit of an eccentric by all accounts, and used to take his pet lobster for walks on a lead on the streets of Paris. My sort of poet, and more interesting than Browning.

Comments
Sign in or get an account to comment.