Elégie funèbre [English translation]

Cover me with flowers if it has to be done.

Let the man with the scythe come.

And if my eyelids are sewn,

at least don't laugh behind

[my back].

Let [him] whisper in my hear

and turn me, the bee, into honey,

and let [him] live in my shadow,

even though the drunken boat1

sinks.

Believe me, in this world,

never has anyone thanked me.

Wherever it had been, whenever2it was,

whoever it was, wherever3 it was,

[everything] went away.

It is for [the sake of] my frail and dead flesh

that I pray you to do so:

4I shall not be admitted into earth

unless you lower there too...

Let remain here of my past,

in this freshly ironed vault,

the wedding suit and the [cardboard] box,

the bone

of my tongue and my chin.

The fingernail can hardly be pointed,

making the hand [look] like a spider,

the eyes go quiet and the cornea

is weighing

from under the cemented eyebrow arch.

Crown me with mauve flowers

if you see my life fleeing,

and prevail upon darkness,

you shall read the lights of the funeral

oration.

Take care of me if you can,

form an ave [Maria] with your mouths,

let God place it or bring it,

be Him [the only one to stand] on the step of my closed

door.

Cover me with flowers if it has to be done.

Cover me with flowers if it has to be done...

1. allusion to Rimbaud's famous poem "Le Bateau ivre"2. Manset's versions reads "oncques ce soit", "oncques" being an archaic word used in negative time complements like "never more" or "nothing ever". This version might have tried to replace it with something more understandable, changing the meaning (wherever instead of whenever)3. again the original reads "où que ce soit" (wherever it might be), but this version just repeats "whoever" (in present tense instead of past)4. line breaks and ellipsis are misleading here. These two lines are linked with the next stanza.