English Poems

Le vent de la mer se lève

~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

Le vent de la mer se lève
(Alyscamps, Arles)

Tout doux, le vent de la mer se lève
parmi les colonnes à l’aube de l’an,
dans mon esprit réjouissant
ressuscitant mon ancien rêve,
un rêve de tuiles couleurs du couchant,
un rêve de murs couleurs océan.

Le vent se renforce et lève la sève
des hauts platanes le long de la rue,
ces forts piliers du ciel du Midi…
Mais quel tombeau révèle le rêve,
lieu lumineux et réapparu ?
Ô vent de la mer, Ô vent de ma vie !

Christina Egan © 2015

Wide avenue with sarcophagi to the left and right,leading to a mediaeval portal. Winter scene in fair weather, light-brown and light-blue.

Alyscamps, Arles. Photograph:  Christina Egan © 2010

 

The Wind from the Sea is rising
(Alyscamps, Arles)

The Wind from the Sea is rising, all mild,
between the columns and graves at the dawn
of the year, stirring up in my jubilant mind
my resplendent dream of antiquity,
a dream of tiles resembling the sun,
a dream of walls resembling the sea.

The wind is now swelling and ready to rouse
the sap in the plane-trees along the wide road,
those pillars supporting the sky of the South…
Which tomb may hold my mystery of old,
the luminous place that has just reappeared?
O Wind from the Sea, O wind of my soul!

Christina Egan © 2016

Painting by van Gogh: Avenue with very high trees, with path and foliage in bright orange, sarcophagi and sky in blue.

The Roman cemetery known as the Alyscamps has been immortalised by Paul Gauguin and Vincent van Gogh.

Vincent van Gogh: L’Allée des Alyscamps (1888). Photograph: Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

You can read an English and German poem about a Roman road in France at Where Road and River Meet / Überm Fluß . 

In Praise of Darkness / Lob des Dunkels

~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

In Praise of Darkness

This winter, when the day shrinks
like a lake swallowed by desert,
my lyre shall not praise the light
but the darkness.

When I rise before the sun
and a candle dazzles the eyes,
I will give it space,
watch it dance, entranced.

We have switched on the bright light
and the non-stop stereo sound:
we have switched off the darkness,
the silence, the peace.

Christina Egan © 2015

—

Lob des Dunkels

Diesen Winter, wenn der Tag schrumpft
wie ein See, von Wüste verschlungen,
lobe meine Leier nicht das Licht,
sondern das Dunkel.

Wenn ich mich vor der Sonne erhebe
und eine Kerze das Auge blendet,
werde ich ihr Raum gewähren,
wie sie tanzt, entzückt betrachten.

Eingeschaltet hat man das helle Licht
und den unablässigen Stereoton;
ausgeschaltet hat man das Dunkel,
die Stille, den Frieden.

Christina Egan © 2015

—

Much of my work  praises light: sunshine,
summer, solstice; sunrise, noon, sunset…

Yet we need darkness, too: to make the light
shine brighter, to make other sources of light
visible, to gain inner peace.

My previous post, Januarsonne, rejoices in
sunshine in midwinter!

Screen

~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

Screen

Last night, at last, beside
your arms, you opened wide
your lips – and in the stream
of quivering delight
below the lifted screen
I touched your silver soul –
One moment, I felt whole –
But then you sank away,
it was already day:
you had been but a dream.

Christina Egan © 2015

Where Road and River Meet

~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

Where Road and River Meet
(Ambrussum, France)

I hold the echo of a thousand feet,
of hob-nailed sandals and of dainty boots;
I hold the echo of a thousand wheels,
of carts and coaches and a thousand hooves.

My inside holds the echo of the waves,
the splashing of the oars, of hands and feet,
the shouts and sighs of children and of slaves:
I am the arch where road and river meet.

I have withstood the floods, withstood the storms;
of once eleven comrades, I’m the last.
I guard the memory with sturdy arms:
I’ll hold your voices, too, when you have passed.

Christina Egan © 2015

—

Überm Fluß
(Ambrussum, Frankreich)

Den Nachhall halte ich von tausend Schritten,
Sandalen grob und Stiefeln elegant,
den Nachhall auch von tausend Rädern, Ritten,
von Karren und von Kutschen über Land.

Mein Hohlraum widerhallt vom Wellenschlagen,
vom frischen Klatsch von Ruder, Hand und Fuß,
von Seufzer oder Ruf von Kindern, Sklaven:
Ich bin der Brückenbogen überm Fluß.

Ich widerstand den Fluten und den Stürmen;
elf Kameraden einst,—nur ich blieb stehn.
Gedenken sammle ich mit starken Armen —
und eure Stimmen im Vorübergehn.

Christina Egan © 2015

Grey Roman arch on two bridge pillars between blue water and blue sky

The remaining arch of the  Pont Ambroix at Ambrussum, once part of the Via Domitia from Italy through France to Spain.


Photograph: By Clem Rutter, Rochester, Kent, via Wikimedia Commons.

I begin this year’s posts like last years’: with a Roman road !

A Faint Rainbow (Christmas Card)

~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

A Faint Rainbow
(Christmas Card)

A faint rainbow maybe,
draped across a frozen market,
a filigree tree in the foreground,Old Dutch painting: lively scene of skaters between barren trees, steep gables and a pink manor house
some leisurely loops of skaters,
cloaked figures arranged like mute music –
that’ll do for a Christmas poem.

Good that my second-hand thoughts
and my second-rate verse
are still better than any in town
and almost as good as mulled wine…
And good that my real-life love
turns every single day into Christmas!

Christina Egan © 2012

These lines were inspired by this round painting :
A Winter Scene with Skaters near a Castle, ca. 1608-09,
by Hendrick Avercamp. — © National Gallery, London

The Last Advent

~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

The Last Advent

The rolling emerald hills,
the towering topaz rocks,
the earth-girding ocean
in its royal blue roar,
even the starred sky
in its silvery silence –

Like a sumptuous silk robe
and an embroidered curtain,
they will be drawn aside
to reveal the true splendour –
Then they will be discarded
like rough grey sloughs.

And new worlds will arise,
circles of festive fire.
Shadeless, doubtless,
deathless, boundless.
And we shall be alive
for the first time, forever.

Christina Egan © 2012

Hildegard_WerkGottes_12Jh_

 

These lines remind us of the double meaning of ‘Advent’: the first coming of Jesus, when he  was born to Mary, and the second coming at the end of times, when this world will be replaced by an eternal one beyond imagination.

Picture: from a 12th century codex of  Hildegard of Bingen’s Book of Divine Works.

The Pattern of a Yesterday / Golden Dell

~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

The Pattern of a Yesterday
(Knossos, Crete)

Knossos: woman in very colourful blouse sitting in a reconstructed window of the palace, in front of the same very colourful mural shown in the other photo.

the colossal columns
of the proud pine-trees
that lofty canopy offering shelter
from the flood of sun

the black and white and blood-red pillars
in the serene maze of the palace
those patches in the pattern of a yesterday
which is millennia past

Christina Egan © 2012

Flourishes on a mural, turquoise on luminous red and yello

 

The same mural in the palace
at Knossos, Crete. Photograph:
Harrieta171 via Wikimedia.

For German poems about Crete,
go to the cycle Kretische Küste.
For more about Crete, see below!

Golden Dell
(Chania, Crete)

You sip your coffee in the market-square
lapped by a sky and sea which both are blue;
you notice other folk from everywhere
and read this was the Roman forum, too.

You pass a corner with a golden dell:
stairs down and down, a hundred ages’ span…
The layers blur, solidify and swell,
and history unfolds, a dazzling fan.

Christina Egan © 2015

 

The Minoan civilisation is the oldest urban civilisation in Europe. The royal palace at Knossos, dating back almost 3,500 years, has the first stone street of Europe. Chania on Crete, a city of stone even 5,000 years ago, is one of the oldest continously inhabited European settlements. You look back on 100 and more generations…

My German translation of the first poem is called gesternmuster.

Zest

~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

Zest

In splashes of fresh golden-green
the leaves cascade down the tree,
a banner of zest!
However warm, though, it grows,
however late the light flows,
still gilding the west,
the promise of lemon and lime
will never turn green in good time,
green true to a tree.
From nascent glow through the length
of summer and on to the strength
of ripe revelry,
the waves of the leaves will pour
not-yet or not-any-more
convincingly green:
The graceful acacia-tree
has the dubious destiny
of virginal sheen.

Christina Egan © 2015

Little tree with apple-green leaves in a park in average summerly green

Photograph: Christina Egan © 2015

It was a poem by Hermann Hesse that drew my attention to the acacia tree:
September (Der Garten trauert)  is online with my rhymed English translation.

Clustering

~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

Clustering

The world has gone weird:
When you switch the screen on,
any time, the news
contain news, the speeches
convey meaning, and the people
speak into the cameras as if
there were a point in speaking.
Can you see their smiles form dimples?

Like fog used to fill the roads,
so rumours waft and can’t be dispelled
that some representatives of the people
represent the people.
Like flocks of birds used to cover the squares,
so citizens cluster and can’t be dispersed,
until they witness those colours rising
which they have proudly painted themselves.

 Christina Egan © 2015

When Webs of Steel / Von stählernen Waben

~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

When Webs of Steel

When webs of steel and walls of glass
confine you to a square of grass –
stand still and feel your sap pulsate:
You have a face. You have a fate.

When no one listens, no one knows you,
when no one loves you or else shows you,
take a deep breath – take two – take cheer:
I know, across the seas. I’m here.

Christina Egan © 2009

—

Von stählernen Waben

Von stählernen Waben und gläsernen Wänden
beschränkt auf ein spärliches gräsernes Eck,
steh’ stille und spüre dein Blut in den Händen:
Du hast ein Gesicht; und du hast ein Geschick.

Will keiner dich kennen, verstehen und lieben,
gibt keiner verborgene Neigungen her,
hol’ Atem – hol’ Atem – und freu’ dich am Leben:
Ich weiß es ja, bin ja bei dir übers Meer!

Christina Egan © 2015

—

In these lines, the anonymous and monotonous modern life described in Amidst the rush / Schrumpft die Welt and höhlenmenschen / cavemen
is overcome: whenever individuals become aware of themselves — and appreciate each other — as unique personalities.

This poem may be declaring love or expressing affection between family members or close friends.