Beckett, Samuel: Quatre Poèmes*

1. Dieppe

again the last ebb

the dead shingle

the turning then the steps

toward the lighted town

2.

my way is in the sand flowing

between the shingle and the dune

the summer rain rains on my life

on me my life harrying fleeing

to its beginning to tis end

my peace is there in the receding mist

when I may cease from trreading these long shifting thresholds

and live the space of a door

that opens and shuts

3.

what would I do without this world faceless incurious

where to be lasts but an instant where ebery instant

spills in the void the ignorance of having been

without this wave where in the end

body and shadow together are engulfed

what would I do without this silence where the murmurs die

the pantings the frenzies toward succour towards love

without this sky that soars

above it's ballast dust

what would I do what I did yesterday and the day before

peering out of my deadlight looking for another

wandering like me eddying far from all the living

in a convulsive space

among the voices voiceless

that throng my hiddenness

4.

I would like my love to die

and the rain to be falling on the graveyard

and on me walking the streets

mourning the first and last to love me

*translated from French by the author