The End of Wandering

Drawn by the magnet of distant constellations
and the desire to serve an Ideal
nebulous, thin and colourless,
I knew the sorrows of Nostos,
that Greek urge to wander
through oceans, islands, peninsulas
and continents,
and thus inflict deep and
unparalleled suffering
on my own body
and on my soul
and on those who waited for me
hoping I would return to my home shore!


And for having wanted to abolish,
for my own personal convenience
and before the due hour,
the frontiers between nations
laid down through centuries of struggle,
I fell into the trap
of excess, intemperance
and pride,
all things that I regret
in many ways!


For I stepped across the boundaries
of cosmic law
and divine Necessity!


To punish me for my deeds,
the Eumenides,
the Exalted Goddesses of Greece
pursued me relentlessly even into my dreams
and Dionysus himself,
a God whose praises I once sang,
burdened me with terrible fits of anger
and finally cast down upon me
a Mania, a Dionysian folly,
a madness directed at my own existence
which undermined the very foundations
of my life!


But today, I can utter a sigh
of relief and freedom from care for
I've rebuilt my life
on new foundations
by putting an end for ever
to what was evil in my life:
my previous condition
of unrepentant wandering!


Yes, with tears in my eyes
and a shiver of holiness
over my entire body, like a new Ulysses,
I saw once again the smoke
of the Ithacan hearth,
and in those very places
which saw me blossom
into the man I am from the shy adolescent
I was,
I built a sanctuary
in honour of Apollo Alaios
or Aletes,
the Apollo of vagabonds, wanderers
and travellers!


So now,
even my taste for travelling far,
for the Other, for Elsewhere,
is better satisfied,
excessively so,
because, throughout the country
of my ancestors,
I can contemplate
easily and pleasurably,
a multitude of universes
whirling around as many suns!

Yet, I still
preserve with infinite care
the language I learned on my travels,
thus
giving homage to my past sufferings
which, despite everything,
brought me Knowledge,
the goal of men and women
in this life
and the next!

FROM THE COLLECTION OF POEMS "LA FIN DE L'ERRANCE"

PUBLISHED IN FRANCE
BY ENCRES VIVES ON SEPTEMBER 2006.
TRANSLATED IN ENGLISH BY NORTON HODGES
ON THE 21ST SEPTEMBER 2006