The Yale Anthology of Twentieth-Century French Poetry

JULES SUPERVIELLE

A Poet

I don’t always go alone to the bottom of my self;
Quite often living captives keep me company.
Those who have stepped inside my cold caverns,
Are they sure that they can ever leave again?
Like a sinking ship I pile up in my night
Pell-mell all the passengers and sailors,
Then I turn o√ every cabin’s light;
The great depths will soon become my friends.
—patricia terry

Regretting the Earth

Some day we will be saying, ‘‘That was the time of the sun,
Do you remember its light fell on the slightest twig,
The elderly woman or young astonished girl,
As soon as it touched it gave their color to things,
Kept pace with the galloping horse and stopped when he did,
That unforgettable time when we were still on Earth
Where if we dropped something it made a noise,
We would look around us with our knowing eyes,
And our ears would catch the slightest nuance in the air,
When the footsteps of a friend approached, we knew,
We used to gather flowers or smooth pebbles,
At that time we never could take hold of smoke,
Ah! What else can our hands do for us now?’’
—patricia terry