MFLT

L’horloge

THE CLOCK

СловаCharles Baudelaire
МузыкаLaurent Boutonnat
ПереводPeter Zollman
Язык английский
Перевод предоставлен www.brindin.com/vb32inde.htm

Oh clock, sinister god, dreadful, indifferent,

You warn raising a finger: “Remember!” and you start:

The poisoned darts of Grief, aimed at your wary heart

Always pursue the target, onto the bitter end.

The fleeting haze of ecstasy soon flies away

Like spirits of the air suddenly lost to sight;

Each hungry moment steals a helping of delight,

Your heirloom, meant to last until your dying day.

Three thousand six hundred times in every hour

The Second purrs: “Remember!” — The greedy woodworm,

The Present scratches on: I’m the Past. In my term

I chewed out of your life the most I could devour!

Remember! Souviens-toi!, squanderer! Esto memor!

(My metal throat can speak to all the nations).

The minutes, foolish man, are excavations,

You must ceaselessly delve to reach the golden ore!

Remember that Time is an unrelenting player,

He wins, no cheating, every game! So is decreed.

The great abyss, Remember! waits with hungry greed;

The glass runs out; the nights grow long, the days turn greyer.

Your patron, Chance will soon have no more time to wait,

Your bride, the precious Virtue, who is still a virgin,

And Repentance (oh, final shelter!) will be urging:

“Go on old coward, die! it’s getting rather late!”



© RuMoHoR 2001—2014