Tu largues les amarres
Et je pars à la dérive.
Tes souliers vagabonds s’emparent
Des couleurs et de l’eau vive
Laissant derrière eux l’ombre
Des heures qui n’en finissent pas,
Dans le silence broyant où je sombre.
Et tu m’effaces sous tes pas.
Adrift- Photo credit: ecstaticist / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA
Footsteps – Photo credit: VinothChandar / Foter.com / CC BY
unbuttoned or undone 
Ouah, cherie, c’est douloureux, ce poeme.
Et tu ecris en Francais cette fois.
Je me demande pourquoi.
C’est aussi bien en Anglais, je crois.
Mais tu as la raison, je suis sur.
Bien ecrit, comme toujours, mais triste, trop triste.
LikeLike
Tu sais, je l’ai ecrit en mi-janvier. C’est sorti en francais alors je l’ai laisse comme cela. Je n’arrive pas a trouver les mots justes en anglais.
Tu as raison c’est un poeme triste. Je me sentais perdue quand je l’ai ecrit.
LikeLike
i had to translate it into english to read it…
but it was so very worth the effort….
::sigh::
LikeLike
Thank you Holly. I appreciate that. Sometimes it comes out in French and then I have trouble turning it into English; I am not satisfied with the translation, and I feel like it should be done over from scratch, so I end up leaving it alone 😦
LikeLike
the google translator may have made it a bit choppy…and i can only imagine attempting to express something in different languages…but the essence came through…
but now you have made me wish very much that i could speak…french. 🙂
LikeLike
It’s never too late to give it a try Holly. 😉
Six months in a francophone country and you will speak it. Almost surely.
LikeLike
I fear i cannot comment as google translate seems to have completely bonkers on this 😦
LikeLike
Sorry it took so long but here it is my friend. A translation that is almost faithful to the meaning.
Drift
You pull up the anchor
And I drift away
Your vagabond shoes take away
Colors and living water while
Leaving behind the shadow
Of endless hours and a crushing silence
In which I sink.
And you erase me with each step.
LikeLike
Well, that makes a little more sense!
This is what Google Translate had:
You break up with the ropes
And I’m going to drift.
Your shoes vagabonds seized
Colors and Whitewater
Leaving behind the shadow
Hours that never end,
In the silence I grinding dark.
And you erased me under your feet.
LikeLike
Well, the last line is OK:-)
LikeLike
Not really 🙂
LikeLike
Thank you. Yes, of course you are right, it’s not OK at all.
LikeLike
Tell me, Emmy, have you ever Camus in French and English? Be interested to hear if something is lost in the translation.
LikeLike
I read The Stranger in both languages. It was a good translation in which the text flowed smoothly. I don’t remember noticing missing elements beit in style or content in the text. Anything in particular you have in mind?
LikeLike
Actually, that was the one i was thinking of. Just wanted to know if Meursault’s disconnectedness was more pronounced in French than English.
LikeLike
Honestly, It’s been years since I read the English version, but I read the French version again more recently, so that is what I remember. Meursault’s disconnection is jarring in French. It is annoying, unsettling, on the edge of unbelievable.
LikeLike
Ahhhh, and that is why Camus was a genius. Meursault is a thousand-times more frightening than some butcher or even a deranged dictator. He scares us like no other character not because we can’t understand him, but because we fear we might just be him.
LikeLike
Bonjour, Em, Que vous avez écrit, (avec ma capacité de traduction pauvre) me donne les sensations de solitude et d’abandon. Il est écrit admirablement bien que.
Les étreintes,
Paul
LikeLike
Thank you so much Paul. Yes, you understood the feelings I was trying to convey.
LikeLike