Best Oeuvres Poems

I feel a sense of déjà vu as I listen
to the cacophony of voices:
dilettantes discussing poetry 
under baroque chandeliers. Masquerading 
as avant-garde writers or bona fide critics 
(black turtlenecks; color is an anomaly and suspicious), 
they claim carte blanche to spew 
pompous platitudes,
pronounce entire oeuvres...

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Where do we come in
					in medias res  not knowing nor caring when
doesn’t everybody pine being number one we leave behind our lives in pages  pictures  or else make for images of what we saw dreamt of as part of our lives in...

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Translation of Eric Mottram’s Courbet: Elegy 8 by T. Wignesan

Blanches oeuvres ouvertes
résident dans les jours
la surface du banc de travail est noire
les géraniums-lierres
les fougères et les adragans
accumulent leurs oeuvres et jours:
La toile noire de Courbet
un endroit où la lumière
puisse-être enfoncée
avec un couteau
pour créer une crête
cassée...

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DINNER

Tonight we’ll dine 
At a restaurant fine
.To order, we’ll start 
With the French words,
Entrée and a la carte.

Hors d oeuvres, escargo, 
Brei and dubonnet.
If those mean food,
Why don’t they say?
Foi gras and boeuf.
Grass-fed beef?

Next on the menu:
Pesto, calamari,
Vermicelli, tortellini.
Served with bianco, chianti, 
Oh me!

Not to...

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Tu le fera, n’est-ce pas, Papa ? – Translation of Kevin Gilbert’s « Won’t you, Dad ? » by T. Wignesan

Si toutes les jolies mélodies
de ce monde eussent été chantées
et toutes les chefs d’œuvres des maîtres
fussent être exhibées dans des meilleurs galléries
et toutes les statues...

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Prison Souvenirs, Translation of Paul Verlaine’s poem : Souvenirs de prison, March 1874*

(Verlaine was sentenced to serve a term of two years in prison for having shot his erstwhile lover in the arm/hand, the legendary poet Arthur Rimbaud, ten years his junior, on July 9th...

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Many 
contestants;
great,  
small, 
experts, 
novices.
Many 
entries; 
masterworks,  
masterpieces, 
chef d' 
oeuvres, 
magnum 
opuses,doggorels.
Well 
experienced 
Judges 
with 
wonderful 
tastes for 
poetry,
Ready and 
eager to 
have my 
lines 
examined. 
With my 
blunt 
pencil and 
grandpa's 
dictionary,
I worked 
hard to 
pen down 
this 
doggerel.
With my 
grain...

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Hark there kind sir, what brings you here?
A message for my lady, from Sir Lyle Gere
He penned these lines, for her gentle ear
Would you have this delivered, pray kind sir
Indeed I will, my word is my honour
Fear not kind sir, for tonight it will see...

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A Self-Tutoring Translation of RIMBAUD's Final Version " Vowels " in Contemporary Terms

(" Vowels " (final version, without the definite article, with the poet's corrections)  in RIMBAUD Œuvres complètes. Ed. by Pierre Brunel. Paris : Livres de Poche/La Pochethèque, 1999, pp. 279-280. Please see...

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Ballade : In favour of those called Decadents and Symbolists, Translation of Paul Verlaine’s Ballade en faveur des dénommés Décadents et Symbolistes

						for Léon Vanier*

(The texts I use for my translations are from : Yves-Alain Favre, Ed. Paul Verlaine : Œuvres Poétiques Complètes. Paris : Robert...

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Poems about Things that Break I
 
These are poems about things that break and/or shatter: a bubble, glass, a mirror, a twig or tree limb, a thunderstorm, cities and towers in times of war, old habits, our hearts, and sometimes Love itself.
 
 
 
Shattered
by...

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Conquistador, Translation of Paul Verlaine’s tercets : Conquistador

Message to fellow soupers: I have been trying to upload, in vain, yet another translation of a 
 Paul Verlaine poem titled: "Ballade in favour of those called Decadents and Symbolists" since 28/09/2013, so if anyone is interested...

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In an orb of knowledge, walks a colored girl.
Her celestial being is ethereal.
Abreast is she of her past but fragile to the imminence.
Her strides are hindered because once she was poor and her life was lost in that
      remembrance.
In the...

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A Self-Tutoring Translation of RIMBAUD's " The Vowels " in Contemporary Terms

(" The Vowels " in the Paul Verlaine (first version) copy in RIMBAUD Œuvres complètes. Ed. by Pierre Brunel. Paris : Livres de Poche/La Pochethèque, 1999, pp. 279-280. Please see notes following the translation....

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Poems about Things that Break III
 
These are poems about things that break and/or shatter: a bubble, glass, a mirror, a twig or tree limb, a thunderstorm, cities and towers in times of war, old habits, our hearts, and sometimes Love itself.
 
 
 
The...

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