Once upon many a time
A man loved a woman
A woman loved a man
A man and a woman
Didn’t love
The ones who loved them
Once upon many a time.
Once and maybe only once
A man and a woman
Loved each other.
-– Robert Desnos (1900-1945)
(trans. from the French by David Lehman)
from the archive; first posted February 13, 2009
I love the poetry of Robert Desnos. I think his harrowing masterpiece, "I Have Dreamed Of You So Much," is one of the world's great love poems. I recommend Paul Auster's translation.
Thank you for posting the poetry of Robert Desnos who died fairly young in a concentration camp. In the anthology I culled & edited for The Everyman's Pocket Library, Poems of Paris, I include several of his poems, including the tragic, "Rue Saint-Martin Couplets."
Posted by: Emily Fragos | July 25, 2022 at 05:17 PM