Valentine

Late evening, on the first of May—
The twilit May—the time of love.
Meltingly called the turtle-dove,
Where rich and sweet pinewoods lay.
Whispered of love the mosses frail,
The flowering tree as sweetly lied,
The rose's fragrant sigh replied
To love-songs of the nightingale.
In shadowy woods the burnished lake
Darkly complained a secret pain,
By circling shores embraced again;
And heaven's clear sun leaned down to take
A road astray in azure deeps,
Like burning tears the lover weeps.

(Karel Hynek Mácha: May)

February is now only and these verses about love would look like not to fit to the current time. But it is not so like one could imagine for the first look. I am not in no way some favorer of the coming holiday, St. Valentine, because it has no absolutely anything to do with history and culture of my country.

Traditionally, just May is connected with love. Nevertheless, I have not resisted and I have strayed in SL at a ball in our community yesterday. This one was just Valentine’s ball. There were several people in the romantic arbour in Bohemia. So, I have call one lady to dance. Evening has run in nice atmosphere, so no one has wanted to leave.

What was there? So I offer some pictures for an inspiration, even if two last ones are from other time and other place.


The whole poem is here.

The Power of Love

Ou-Jang Siou (1007 – 1072)

When the Moon was in the Milky Way

The loved pink color
of the some light, delicate branches
burst in the new breath of the east wind.
In the fog, which hided them, and in the dew tears
say for whom
were they so seductive? For someone
or only therefore did
tender butterfly and impulsive bee dare?
With my heart blown up with some feelings
I walked through these sweet places
and adored the greenery around.
But my ecstasy wafted out... Without comeback
my pleasure, which was so hungered, it was gone.
The Moon, so sad that it would tear apart your heart,
came near to the horizon.
Suddenly, the springtime got older.

(The poem from the anthology of the Chinese poetesses and poets of Sung dynasty [960 – 1270 A.D.], from the French original „Floriège de sont poèmes Song“ by French sinologist George Soulié de Morant, was translated by the Vladimir Holan in Czech; and I, Coral Ducatillon, I have tried to translate it in inverse into English in the way of the free verse. This anthology was published under the title “Melancholy” for the first and for the last time in year 1948 in Czechoslovakia of that time.)

One day and sometimes for a long time, there was a garden here. I roamed long, I sought long, and then I found it. There were the butterfly's wings, the tree leaves, the flower petals, water, grass, the trees and a swan.

An even if I looked around as a voyeur, for all that it had been only in good sense. I had the permit to watch and to listen, but only from some distance. Some lonely bank has been attracted the lonely lovers. And then, after sunset, some curious flowers had fallen to the earth and had begun to cover the world under a mysterious mist.

The next moment, an explosion of an aurora australis had lit the night sky. The whole world had shaken to its foundation due to the power of love.

To leave such a nice place was not simple, but a boat has been waiting for me in the shine of Moon, this one that is a silent wanderer of the lovers.

The lost paradise disappeared forever.

* * * * For Michaela and Pavel * * *