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“Ailing Autumn” by Guillaume Apollinaire 🇫🇷 (26 Aug 1880 – 9 Nov 1918)
Translated from the French by John Cobley
Autumn ailing and adored
You will die when the wind storm blows in rose gardens
When it snows
In orchards
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Poor autumn
Dies in the whiteness and richness
Of snow and ripe fruit
Deep in the sky
The sparrow hawks glide
Above the tiny gentle green-haired water nymphs
Who have never loved
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At the distant forest edges
Stags have been bellowing
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And how I love O season how I love your murmurs
The fruits falling without being picked
The wind and the forest that weep
All their tears in autumn leaf by leaf
Leaves
That are trampled
A train
That passes
Life
That slips away