"En vos longs corps soyeux que votre langue lustre,
O chats, un dieu fantasque alluma comme un lustre
D'esprit càpricant et malin,
Et, quand vous ronronnez, discrets, prés de la flamme,
Nul ne sait si vos cœurs ne recèlent point l'âme
D'un Voltaire ou d'un Poquelin"
july 1882
COMMENTS
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Isis101
02:39 May 31 2014
I wish I could read French, as you always find interesting things to put in your journal. All I know is that this is something about the philosophy of cats...lol
Serenity
14:09 May 31 2014
was going to say this is horrible french till I saw the date of the poem and then I realized this is old french so it was this kind of writing they did back then :)
kind a like the old english I see sometimes, very interesting
Dragonrouge
00:09 Jun 18 2014
Basically it sais something like:
"In your long silken bodies that your tongue luster,
oh cats, a fantastical god lits, like a chandelier
of capricious and devilish spirit.
And when you purr, discretly, close to the flame,
noone sais if your hearts doesn`t harbour a bit of the soul
of a Voltaire or a Moliere."
(sorry, it`s my translation, and not very good, I couldn`t find a translation of Guaita`s poems in English)
I have a character in a Moliere theater play and while I was repeating my text near my tomcat, Murr, these verses fascinated me.
2000 years since we adore them, isn`t it?