Guillaume ApollinaireTranslated, from the French, by Donald Revell
Sighs of the Dakar Gunner
In the log dugout camouflaged by reeds Alongside colorless north-facing artillery I dream the African village Where we danced where we sang where we made love And made long Noble joyful speeches I see my father again who fought The Ashantis In the English service I see my sister again with her mad laugh Her breasts hard as bombshells And I see My mother again the sorceress who alone of all the villagers Refused salt Pounding millet in a mortar I remember something so delicate so disturbing A fetish in a tree And the double fetish of fecundity Eventually a severed head Beside a marshland O pallor of my enemy It was a silver head And in the marshes It was the moon shining It was still a silver head Overhead the moon danced It was still a silver head I was invisible in the grotto It was still a Negro head in the deep night Resemblances Pallors And my sister Went off later with a rifleman Killed at Arras To know how old I am I'd have to ask the bishop So tender so tender with my mother Like butter like butter with my sister It was in a hut Less savage than this dugout I've known the hunters' ambush in the marshland Where the giraffe drinks with her legs spread wide I've known the horror of an enemy who lays waste The village Rapes the women Steals the girls And steals the boys whose hard bottoms twitch I've carried the administrator for weeks at a time Village to village Singing And I was a servant in Paris I don't know how old I am But at the draft board They said twenty I'm a soldier of France and so they bleached me white Sector 59 in God knows where Why is whiteness better than blackness Why not dance and make speeches Eat and then sleep afterwards And we shoot at the German supply lines Or at the barbed wire in front of the dogfaces Under the metal storm I remember a horrid lake And couples chained by atrocious love A wild night A night of sorcery Like tonight Where many horrid eyes Burst in the gorgeous sky
Guillaume Apollinaire (18801918) was the author of nine books, including poetry, fiction, and art criticism. His first collection of poetry, L'enchanteur pourrissant, was published in 1909, and his reputation was established in 1913 with Alcools. He became a French national by enlisting in the infantry during World War I, and suffered a head wound in 1916. He died of influenza during the epidemic, on November 9, 1918, in Paris. Calligrammes, a collection of concrete poetry, was published a few months after his death. Donald Revell is the author of seven collections of poetry, most recently Arcady (Wesleyan, 2002).
