VOUS QUI RETOURNEZ DU CATHAI
Vous qui retournez du Cathai
Par les Messageries,
Quand vous berçaient à leurs féeries
L' opium ou le thé.
Dans un palais d' aventurine
Où se mourait le jour,
Avez-vous vu Boudroulboudour,
Princesse de la Chine,
Plus blanche en son pantalon noir
Que nacre sous l' écaille ?
Au clair de lune, Jean Chicaille,
Vous est-il venu voir,
En pleurant comme l' asphodèle
Aux îles d' Ouac-Wac,
Et jurer de coudre en un sac
Son épouse infidèle,
Mais telle qu' à travers le vent
Des mers sur le rivage
S' envole et brille un paon sauvage
Dans le soleil levant ?
You who return from Cathay
By mailboat, when rocked on the sea
By the magic alchemy
Of opium or tea.
In a palace of aventurine
In the waning hour
The princess, Boudroulboudour,
By you was she seen
Whiter in her black pants
Of opium or tea.
In a palace of aventurine
In the waning hour
The princess, Boudroulboudour,
By you was she seen
Whiter in her black pants
Than nacre in the shell?
By moonlight, Jean Chicaille,
Is it you he wants,
Weeping like the asphodel
In the Islands of Ouac-Wac,
And swearing to sew in a sack
His wife, unfaithful,
And untamed as a peahen
That flies away, ablaze
In the onshore winds and the rays
Of the rising sun?
By moonlight, Jean Chicaille,
Is it you he wants,
Weeping like the asphodel
In the Islands of Ouac-Wac,
And swearing to sew in a sack
His wife, unfaithful,
And untamed as a peahen
That flies away, ablaze
In the onshore winds and the rays
Of the rising sun?
NOTES
She is also mentioned in a poem by Wallace Stevens called The Worms at Heaven's Gate in his book Harmonium.
The Worms at Heaven's Gate
Out of the tomb, we bring Badroulbadour,
Within our bellies, we her chariot.
Here is an eye. And here are, one by one,
The lashes of that eye and its white lid.
Here is the cheek on which that lid declined,
And, finger after finger, here, the hand,
The genius of that cheek. Here are the lips,
The bundle of the body and the feet.
. . . . . . . . . . .
Out of the tomb we bring Badroulbadour.
The name Badroulbadour also appears in the novel Come Dance with Me by author Russell Hoban.
Toulet has fashioned Jean Chicaille from the Chinese Yuan-Tché-Kaï , or Yuan Shikai.
The provisional government of the Republic of China was formed in Nanjing on March 12, 1912 with Sun Yat-sen as President, but Sun was forced to turn power over to Yuan Shikai, who commanded the New Army and was Prime Minister under the Qing government, as part of the agreement to let the last Qing monarch abdicate (a decision Sun would later regret). Over the next few years, Yuan proceeded to abolish the national and provincial assemblies, and declared himself emperor in late 1915. Yuan's imperial ambitions were fiercely opposed by his subordinates; faced with the prospect of rebellion, he abdicated in March 1916, and died in June of that year.
Ouac-Waco :
Imaginary islands in 1001 nights inhabited only by women.
Aventurine: reddish variety of quartz, found by chance, hence its
name, containing tiny flakes of mica that reflect the light.
