Rimbaud: Ophelia

 This poem always reminds me of this painting by John Everett Millais, although I don't think Rimbaud could have seen it before writing the poem as a very young man. Elizabeth Siddal, the beautiful model for the painting, had a tragic end like Ophelia.

On the calm black wave where the stars are sleeping
the white Ophelia floats like a great lily.
Floats very slowly, lying in her long veils…
--Far off in the woods there are hunters’ calls.

It’s already more than a thousand years that sad Ophelia
passes, a white phantom, on the long black river;
More than a thousand years that her gentle craziness
murmurs her romantic story to the evening breeze.

The wind kisses her breasts and arranges her great veils,
cradled softly by the waves, in a halo around her;
the shivering willows weep on her shoulder,
the reeds bend above her wide dreaming forehead.

The rumpled lotuses sigh around her;
she awakes sometimes, in a sleeping alder,
some nest from which a little shiver of wing escapes:
--a mysterious chant falls from the golden stars.

O pale Ophelia! beautiful as snow!
Yes you died, child, carried away by a river!
--It’s that the winds coming down from the mountains of Norway
talked to you quietly of bitter freedom;

it’s that a gust, twisting your long hair,
carried strange sounds to your dreaming mind;
your heart heard the singing of nature
in the wails of the tree and the sighs of the nights;

It’s that the voice of the crazy seas, immense groan,
broke your child’s breast, too human and too sweet;
it’s that one morning in April, a handsome pale cavalier,
a poor fool, sat mute at your knees!

Heaven! Love! Freedom! What a dream, O poor foolish girl!
You melted into him like a snow in the fire:
Your great visions strangled your words
--and terrible infinity appalled your blue eye!

--And the poet says that by starlight
you come looking at night for the flowers you gather,
and that he saw on the water, lying in her long veils,
the white Ophelia floating like a great lily.

          --Arthur Rimbaud (1854-1891)

 

Sur l'onde calme et noire où dorment les étoiles
La blanche Ophélia flotte comme un grand lys,
Flotte très lentement, couchée en ses longs voiles...
-- On entend dans les bois lointains des hallalis.

Voici plus de mille ans que la triste Ophélie
Passe, fantôme blanc, sur le long fleuve noir;
Voici plus de mille ans que sa douce folie
Murmure sa romance à la brise du soir.

Le vent baise ses seins et déploie en corolle
Ses grands voiles bercés mollement par les eaux;
Les saules frissonnants pleurent sur son épaule,
Sur son grand front rêveur s'inclinent les roseaux.

Les nénuphars froissés soupirent autour d'elle;
Elle éveille parfois, dans un aune qui dort,
Quelque nid, d'où s'échappe un petit frisson d'aile:
-- Un chant mystérieux tombe des astres d'or.

ô pale Ophélia! belle comme la neige!
Oui tu mourus, enfant, par un fleuve emporté!
-- C'est que les vents tombant des grands monts de Norvège
T'avaient parlé tout bas de l'âpre liberté;

C'est qu'un souffle, tordant ta grande chevelure,
A ton esprit rêveur portait d'étranges bruits;
Que ton coeur écoutait le chant de la nature
Dans les plaintes de l'arbre et les soupirs des nuits;

C'est que la voix des mers folles, immense râle,
Brisait ton sein d'enfant, trop humain et trop doux;
C'est qu'un matin d'avril, un beau cavalier pâle,
Un pauvre fou, s'assit muet à tes genoux!

Ciel! Amour! Liberté! Quel rêve, ô pauvre folle!
Tu te fondais à lui comme une neige au feu:
Tes grandes visions étranglaient ta parole
-- Et l'infini terrible effara ton oeil bleu !

-- Et le poète dit qu'aux rayons des étoiles
Tu viens chercher, la nuit, les fleurs que tu cueillis,
Et qu'il a vu sur l'eau, couchée en ses longs voiles,
La blanche Ophélia flotter, comme un grand lys.

Comments

[Christina]

I have the same line between the painting and Rimbaud's poem.

Except, this painting isn't by Rossetti, but by Sir John Everret Millais. You're right about the Elizabeth Siddal part though, and she DID model for another painting before she died--Beata Beatrix, which was finished in 1863 (this time by Rossetti, Siddal's husband).

[Sedulia]

Thanks Christina. I will change the attribution. I should have double-checked.

[Barry Breen]

I have read somewhere that this poem is a transposition into French of an exercise in Latin verse - not that that fact makes any difference to anything. In a copy I have, the poem is divided into three sections, of four verses, then the next four, then a third section which is the final verse. This makes sense because the first four verses are a straight description, the next four are addressed to the dead Ophelia and the last verse addressed directly to the reader (is it?). This verse is a bit confusing to me because it addresses the reader as "tu", then this becomes "il" (the poet himself?) in the next line.