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Monday, October 29, 2012

sadness

by jean-claude etranger

translated by horace p sternwall

illustrations by eddie el greco





girls in summery blue dresses
with softly fluttering yellow tresses
drift across my waking dreams
like crumbling leaves in shaded streams

seated beneath my favorite tree
in a purple reverie
each drop of rain on each soft leaf
echoes my disconsolate grief

o faithless one! since you betrayed me
no ghost or memory can upbraid me


here on my bench of faded green
i fade into the passing scene

invisible, with soul destroyed
enveloped by the whispering void
here in the evening mist and dew
i rehearse each perfect scene with you

in a play that was never played
of gallant lover and sparkling maid
in a tale that was never spun
in a ballad that was never begun