350

Les Baigneuses, vers 1900-1905

We will not know you, particolour
Figures, while you hesitate so—

You must force yourselves into
Action, slip entirely into the grey

Water, feeling it yield to you,
Weed and stones blowing about

Your solid calves, moved as if by
A sudden, capricious breeze.

There is a kind of fire in the water,
Bellowing softly of its power—

An old fire, dwindling inside an
Ashen frame of brittle wood—

Liable at any second to collapse
And bear your fair bodies with it

Down the tide. O do not remain
So chastely at the water's edge!

Be taken, in this first way, if you
Would not fall to lesser powers.

Abandon yourselves, Mädchen, to
The cool flame, the desolate wind.

349

White Canoe, 1990-1

It is ivory, or marble—
Some blinding material else,
Some godbone out of the
Shadow of a singularity—

It is fulminant, impossible,
Cleaving the water without
Seeming to touch it,
Its reflection bowed

And no less bright.
In the stern a creamy shape
Lies, indistinct. Feathers?
We cannot say. About it,

Marigold lights play,
As if radiating from
The very water. In the
Surface, the colours of

The forest tremble, fragile
And cool. Frond greens,
Cloudlike blues, dying
Amber, here and there

Orbs of white, as though
Some beneficent spirit
Had hung gig-lamps in the
Trees and sown them with

Fire. Below these veils of
Colour, yet more luminous
Shapes may float, trailing
Captured stars in their gills.

348

Pelican (Stag), 2004

Stride, dunkler Held, through
The cobalt-grey overflow
Of daylight between palms :
No room here for timidity or
Complaint, no room than for
The language of the animal
That dies before you, under
Your lance, in the heat of its
Own blood and breath, while
Its last song elaborates, as it
Waits for you to bring it into
Silence. The palms are bold
In their blazon, spilt yoghurt
A callous white, mustard,
Sickening green. Who dress
The trees in such harsh shade?
May be some lower god,
Some insensate servitor, some
Atom out of farthest stars,
Paint them so, thoughtlessly.
You prowl the jungle floor,
Hauling life in with your eyes,
Throwing your hunger upon it.
Go with the spirit : swift, still.
Follow its darker waters there.

347

Gasthof zur Mundentalsperre, 2002

Fireflies move in the grasses,
Faded, flowerlike points at the
Dark edge of luminescence :

In the empty vault overhead, far
Correspondents mirror them,
Motionless carriers of a brighter

Fire, caught there in the arms of
Nebulæ, sung to sleep above the
Softening world. Our bold pair

Stand in their antique costumes
Next to a white gate of frail
Wood, looking wordlessly out

From behind their generous
Moustaches. There is something
Rueful in their posture, as if

They sought uselessly to warn
Against the first mistake of an
Already doomed hero. We are,

In a certain measure, their last
Charges. The wall beside them
Is coralline, bright with colour.

346

Bewegtes Wasser, 1898

Alberich, what faith is still in you,
Watching those white bodies pass
In the water above you, and their
Carmine hair billowing in great
Clouds? Your eyes are shallow
And grey as musselshells. They
Seem to glow with a dull longing.
Come out from behind the torn
Curtain of your beard, speak to
These bright women, come out
Before their nakedness. Forth
Also, words of awkward devotion!
The maidens rise sleepily out of
The deep water : slender, almost
Brittle legs trailing back into the
Dark, backs arched languidly,
Slight breasts hanging softly on
The tide. Their faces flowerlike
And motionless. Ah, he cannot yet
Speak, for love. The water moves
Gently, a fabric of violet and gold.

345

As he passes one house, he sees
An open door at its side and in
The rigid light the door casts a
Pale, shapeless object, as if in
Passing a stranger had made the
Place an offering, leaving it at
The boundary, before the portal.
The shape stirs, revealing itself
To be a bulldog, an albino, red
Around the eyes and gums, no
Collar about its grizzled neck,
Its ears ragged and scarred. He
Slows and stops, watching the
Animal pace wearily out of the
Light toward him, its tread even
And resigned. A few feet from
Him, it stops and seems to wait
For a command. It is darker in
The moonlight, its fur the blue
Of shallow water. Its eyes bear
Out miniature reflections of the
Moon and the stars. There is a
Film of liquid over its nose that
Is silver in the ambient light.
He begins to walk away down
The street. It stays where it is.

344

A sparrow calls outside the
Window, and the grey light
Of morning comes through it.
Before the window, the voices
Of the congregation. Of the
Faces there a light bears out
Other than the fittings bestow.
The voice of the Lord is a
Powerful voice! and it is hope,
Against its abiding futility.

An egret steps gently into the
Shallows near a runoff pipe,
Its plumage a cold white in the
Shade of a willow. Lights wind
Silently across its legs, ribbons
Cast up by the slight motion of
The pale green water.

How empty we are,
In our shackles, each cool day!

343

Stati d'animo serie II. Quelli che vanno, 1911

Are you sleeping, madame, or only resting,
As the carriage forges its darkening way?
What appointment awaits you we cannot
Divine, whether at this moment a family
Stations itself about the table to receive you,
Or whether yet some engagement of another
Sort—some vagabond in a broad raincoat!—
Waits in a restaurant near your country stop,
Watching the hour in each light before the
Stationhouse, ready to identify your figure
As it should appear momentarily before him.
Rain weaves slowly across the pane of your
Compartment, wavering in ropes of a dull
Light, that sustain boldly, only collapsing as
Further gusts force them down. At each
Coupling, the carriages seem more fluid.
A faint, calming light shivers in the corridor—
Home now? What hour is it? She murmurs
Into the darkness of her collar, rousing quietly,
Motionless. There is a blue lamp at her bedside
Table she would extinguish, and so to sleep.

She opens her eyes to the dim compartment.
Far yet out of all rest, all home. For a moment
Her thoughts part from her in her weariness.

342

Let the redbud tree shiver
And the rain break
Across each segment of its
Outheld, meagre branches.

At each junction, let leaves
Rise out of bunches of its
Flowers, loose crowns of
Yellowed green and peach,

Singular leaves swaying
As drops of rain batter
Them : each, depositing
A small part of its mass,

Let catch the light.
Let the redbud tree watch
In its passive colours,
Let no silence master the

Water in its course.
Afford the cardinals their
Voice, that the air should
Bear their keener sound.

O light the day in such
Elements—until it should
Fail—wherein, let darker
And subtler shapes be found.

341

Peter Altenberg, 1909

His moustaches are the shape and colour
Of a tarnished sickle. Soft stains indeed!
There is one in black at his upper lip, of
Which the edges trail the cramped air,
Bristles of frayed wire spraying from a
Sleeve of jaundiced flesh. His mouth is
Barely visible beneath, a fat grub's smart
Orifice. He holds it closed, melancholic.
His neck the watery red of rare beefsteak,
And at its upper boundary a crimson ear,
Full in its broken bloom, and the slight
Outline of his remaining hair. A majority
Of his skull is hairless, and yet it seems
Striated as a rough opening in a facade
Of sedimentary rock, each colour gentle
In its own kind. He would reach into
The air before him—are his malformed
Hands articulate, or simply for show?
How will we know when he begins to act,
Or when his true expression will occur?
His rueful eyes pronounce nothingness.

340

Nirvana, 1890

Brother Jacob, the wall is falling.
No lesser spirits will pass through.

Breakers form in the dark green
Water, where it gathers overhead.

Is it a wave? It would seem the sea
Bore up into the heavens, and all

Its swell communed with the stars :
Are those fireflies glimmering

Behind its curtain, or the heads of
Flowering grasses? Perhaps yet

It is only a green evening sky, and
The breakers fine heads of cloud,

Stained blue in their departure.
O Jacob, what black smoke is it

Pours from your back, in which
Nereids twist, pale as corpses?

Your face seems to light red where
Their hair flames. Your hand held

Before you as if to make a sign.
O, you are devilfish, with your

Feline eyes of empty periwinkle!
Speak now, for the wall is falling.

339

As Redon's Ophelia danced in her flowers
Of yellow and white and red and blue,
As they swam about her, avatars of her
Fallen spirit, as she made her beauty of
Their briefest sounds, speaking words to
Them, seeming lost in their movement—
So too, you move, you smile, you curl
Your aged lip over your lower teeth, coy,
Graceful, holding a bright glass of white
Wine in your left hand, so that the light
Passes in the passing of the music through.
Your crown of blooms wobbles as you
Come forward into the dining room, as
You heave your broad shoulders beneath
A shapeless robe of linen. Ah, your white
Teeth and cavernous eyes! Harmon waits
To slowdance you, to cajole you, to draw
The love out of you—go to him!—be sure
Your perfume makes just as much a fool
Of him as you. Dance alone now, before
The lilies and the tungsten lamp and the
Blurred glow of the far city, in which you
Hold no greater part than does the music,
Than do the stars—let us sit down here like
Ladies and gentlemen, he says hoarsely,
Laughing in his quality of hopelessness
Through the clarity of his drink obscured.

338

Plans par couleurs, 1910-11

There is a light au fond
As of an evening growing
To its maturity : a golden,
Indiscriminate light, dull

In its subtle graduations.
The windowframe seems
To multiply where the air
Passes it, as in a relaxation

Of the eye further images
May slide beyond the sure
Original. In such manifold
Iterations, the dark figure

Of a woman comes before
The light, breaking it into
Lesser shades. A shaft of
Sulphate blue hangs like

A banner from her arm ;
At her crown great curves
Of pale green, bands of a
Heavy russet at the border

Of her corsage. Ghostlike
Colours play restlessly
Across her face. No other
Expression forms there

Than what the light gives :
All that she communicates
Lies in the way she bends
Her soft hand into her hip.

337

The tree is a great wall of movement,
A facade of which the new leaves
Blow fluidly out upon stemlike joists,
Twisting limply in unfinished arcs,
Then fall as the wind falls, shying
Down, become flaccid membranes,
Flags of uniform colour, sans motif,
Save their fine, pale green ribs—lines
That hold fast only as they are pliant.
Light strikes the tree from the west—
Late afternoon. The crown of it is as
The surface of a restless sea that in its
Eternal movement bears out patterns :
The foremost branches will decline ;
Those at the base sway in melancholy ;
From the centre, unawaited changes
May originate ; all may founder, softly.
What are we to name this creature,
That meditates so upon its own energy?
Birds part from it, as from a reef,
Drawing colour out of its broken shade.

336

        Erwachte er,
        Wär's doch nur
        Um für immer zu verscheiden

His body lies pale before a wall
In a landscape desolate of all
Its proudest heritage. The blood
Of his ancestors, that now would
Founder in his fragility, is blent
Out across his shirt. His spent
Breath still moves upon the air :
His eyes fasten outward, there,
Upon the discoloured and bare
Soil, or there, on a further space
That dark figures seem to pace,
As he figures them before him,
His most loved Väter, grown dim.

Now the stream of his being gives
Its light out gently into the grasses.
As he watches the light he yet lives,
Held in it, until its music passes.

335

There is a white Mercedes
Before the house, white in
An absolute sense : colour
Is absent from the fenders,
From the mirrors, from the
Empty headlights. Only in
The indicators and in the
Headlights can colour be
Found: pale orange and a
Dark, dark red. Light rain
Washes its bright surfaces.
At one side, by a forward
Wheel, a panel has been
Removed, and under it the
Metalwork is of the same
Resonant shade. Behind it,
A crepe myrtle bush, full
Of violet flower that seem
To dust the rolling surface
Of its leaves. The flowers
Irrupt the washing air. Out
Of the distance sheets of
Dull thunder ply themselves :
A crow falls slowly across
The long roof and yellow
Clapboard front of the house.

334

From a small, shaded chandelier above
The kitchen table, a pearly sphere of
Ruffled tissue hangs, shadowed in its
Dark recesses, bleached at the ridges
Where it is fragile, pliant—a stemless
Rose, suspended from a chain of string.
He stares before him at the table and
Its small objects, leaning upon it with
His elbow and forearm. His front is an
Expanse of plaid, one shoulder half lit
From the window, the other sloping in
Weak shadow. He seems to hold back
A minor discomfort, resting a hand on
His knee. His head doubles the balled
Tissue : it is a soft orb of light, darker
Recesses below the brow and nose, at
His front great gentle curves—fissures
Only faint, and absent in their faintness.
He is crowned in delicate grey. As he
Watches before him, the light seems
To move in concert, holding him still.

333

Birds pass bodily through the tree,
Through the scattered halo of light
Green, their wings tilting to direct
Them through its shaded corridors,
And out, into the restless evening
Air, where the sound of an engine,
Miles distant, drones like a scoured
Bowl. It is an aircraft—a glimmer
Of white, its fuselage coloured in
Places, blue and red, the figure of
A distant speed and force, bearing
Itself up through the branches, as
A gull hovers almost motionless
In its gentle height. Untouchable,
As if illustrated in minute ébauche
On an overbright background, it 
Shimmers and vacillates, broken
In its image by the interceding gas
And heat, as stars may be known
Only by the tardif light that they
Bestow. The vast attelage lifts out
Of all the dull frame that surrounds,
Breaks the green corona it had
Travelled slowly through, warping
Into the open air of evening, bulk
And impetus bent towards its far
End. Its sound seems to die, and in
Dying invest the air with melodies :
That we are left to speak among us,
Each of us held in what he had seen.

332

Stati d'animo serie II. Gli addii, 1911

What passengers fasten to this impersonal
Engine? It bears itself steadily through lights,
Through green veils of tangled smoke,
Through the apparatus of pylons and relayed
Wires, through the signal lights and pilot
Lights, steam pouring from its blackened
Skull as water trailing from a vase—and in
The steam insensible colours between violet
And cyan, between white and grey, between
Heat and the founding of heat in motion—

Four bold yellow painted numbers hang in
The air before the boilerplate : 6 9 4 3.
Their terminals and finials seem to flare
In the roiling atmosphere as they move
Forcelessly into sight. Their motion is the
Still motion of a candleflame. In the cabin,
A further yellow light seems to hang. 
No human agent appears in reference : it is
As if the machine moved by its will alone.
Fire breeds somewhere within, caged in steel.

331

He stands in the shallows
    Of the yard, where the air
Swims, fresh and cool,
    Over the short grass and
The green mesh fence.

Dappled light plays over
    His brown bucket hat
And the blue and white
    Sailor's collar, and over
His tan corduroy pants.

His white hair moves as
    Candyfloss moves in
The turbulent, bright air
    Of a fairground. His
Head jerks sporadically,

As though he glanced from
    Place to place,
Unsure of where the grass,
    The shrubs, the wood
Leant upon the garage wall

Should be ; as if his
    Catalogue of this small
Territory had been lost,
    And he made a thorough
Survey. Giant green maples

Rear above him, their
    Long, trailing branches
Weighted with starlike
    Flowers. Their volume
Seems a validation to him.