Thursday, November 4, 2010

Time

Jacques Prévert

transl.: Johnny Mercer

Autumn Leaves
(Les feuilles mortes)


Oh, je voudrais tant que tu te souviennes
Des jours heureux où nous étions amis
En ce temps là la vie était plus belle
Et le soleil plus brûlant qu'aujourd'hui

Les feuilles mortes se ramassent à la pelle
Tu vois je n'ai pas oublié
Les feuilles mortes se ramassent à la pelle
Les souvenirs et les regrets aussi
Et le vent du nord les emporte
Dans la nuit froide de l'oublie
Tu vois je n'ai pas oublié
La chanson que tu me chantais

C'est une chanson, qui nous ressemble
Toi tu m'aimais et je t'aimais
Nous vivions tous les deux ensemble
Toi qui m'aimais, moi qui t'aimais

|: Mais la vie sépare ceux qui s'aiment
Tout doucement sans faire de bruit
Et la mer efface sur le sable
Les pas des amants désunis :|

Les pas des amants désunis

Autumn leaves fall and are swept out of sight
The words that you said have gone too
Autumn leaves fall and are swept out of sight
So are the memories of love that we knew

The wind of forgetfulness blows then
Into the night of regret,
The song you would often sing
Is echoing, echoing yet

The falling leaves drift by the window
The autumn leaves of red and gold
I see your lips, the summer kisses
The sun-burned hands I used to hold

Since you went away, the days grow long
And soon, I'll hear old winter's song
But I'll miss you most of all, my darling,
When autumn leaves start to fall
When autumn leaves start to fall



The scenery is going so fast behind the windows. On scene is switching over another one. It is like slow movie, when the frame by the frame of the film strip passes the light source and it is grabbed by the optics, i.e. by the system of the magic lens, to show the two-dimensional picture to the impatient viewers.

However, it is only an illusion. Only bit to draw mist away and to look through a time mirror. An eyewink, the reality is back again. The car is driving through the hairpins and is coming near to a village. It is long time that I was here. The memories are coming up from my memory.

We are on the place. The car has driven through the village and then into the forest. Only for me as if time has stopped. Actually no in the literal sense, because time still passes. It is never-ending story. So, we, PEOPLE, invented it!

In vain I am seeking some words. After all it is useless, though! It suffices only to listen. Yes, it is that space banked by the trees, in whose treetops wind is spinning. I want only to wait. I want only to embrace everything around me. I want only to forget.

The dead leafs cover the graves of the dead. Autumn has come.

(P. S. I wrote this contribution after our visit of the small forest graveyard, where my beloved great-grandmother rest in peace.)

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