La reine de cœur
by Maurice Carême (1899 - 1978)
au français:
Mollement accoudée
A ses vitre de lune,
La reine vous salue
d'une fleur d'amandier.
C'est la reine de cœur.
Elle peut, s'il lui plait,
Vous mener, s'il lui plait,
Vous mener en secret
Vers d'étranges demeures
Où il n'est plus de portes,
De salles ni de tours
Et où les jeune mortes
Viennent parler d'amour.
La reine vous salue;
Hâtez-vous de la suivre
Dans son châeau de givre
Aux doux vitraux de lune.
in English:
Softly leaning
on her window-panes of moon,
the queen gestures to you
with an almond flower.
She is the Queen of Hearts.
She can, if she wishes,
lead you ins ecret
into strange dwellings
where there are no more doors,
or rooms, or towers,
and where the young deat
come to talk of love.
The queen salutes you;
hasten to follow her
into her hoar-frost castle
with smooth stained-glass moon windows.
This is one of may poems by French poet Maurice Carême that he wrote for children. For a children's piece, however, I think it's an incredibly mature text. Carême paints such an incredible portrait of a cold, desolate castle where the Queen of Hearts sits. I picture the witch from the Disney's Chronicles of Narnia movies. The setting is just cold--bitter cold--yet warming. The idea that the Queen of Hearts can beckon you towards her castle and lock you away at her will. Perhaps the location to which she can lead you, "strange dwellings where there are no more doors, or rooms, or towers, and where the young dead come to talk of love" is not actually a place, but an idea. The Queen of Hearts can beckon you to her castle and lead you to heaven.
-Jerron Jorgensen
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