No More Learning

? ?

O my abandoned youth is dead

Like a garland faded

Here the season comes again

Of suspicion and disdain

The landscape's formed of canvasses

A false stream of blood flows down

And under the tree the stars glow fresh

The only passer by's a clown

The glass in the frame has cracked

An air defined uncertainly

Hovers between sound and thought

Between 'to be' and memory

O my abandoned youth is dead

Like a garland faded

Here the season comes again

Of suspicion and disdain

The Bestiary: or Orpheus's Procession

(Le Bestiaire ou Cortege d'Orphee)

Orpheus

Orpheus, Making Music for the Animals

'Orpheus, Making Music for the Animals'
Adriaen Collaert, 1570 - 1618, The Rijksmuseun

Admire the vital power

And nobility of line:

It's the voice that the light made us understand here

That Hermes Trismegistus writes of in Pimander.

The Tortoise

Feeling

'Feeling'
Raphael Sadeler (I), 1581, The Rijksmuseun

From magic Thrace, O delerium!

My sure fingers sound the strings.

The creatures pass to the sounds

Of my tortoise, and the songs I sing.

The Horse

Pegasus

'Pegasus'
Jacopo de' Barbari, 1509 - 1516, The Rijksmuseun

My harsh dreams knew the riding of you

My gold-charioted fate will be your lovely car

That for reins will hold tight to frenzy,

My verses, the patterns of all poetry.

The Tibetan Goat

Hilly Landscape with Two Goats

'Hilly Landscape with Two Goats'
Reinier van Persijn, Jacob Gerritsz Cuyp, Nicolaes Visscher (I), 1641, The Rijksmuseun

The fleece of this goat and even

That gold one which cost such pain

To Jason's not worth a sou towards

The tresses with which I'm taken.

The Serpent

The Fall

'The Fall'
Anonymous, Hieronymus Cock, c. 1558 - c. 1570, The Rijksmuseun

You set yourself against beauty.

And how many women have been

victims of your cruelty!

Eve, Eurydice, Cleopatra:

I know three or four more after.

The Cat

The Large Cat

'The Large Cat'
Cornelis Visscher (II), 1657, The Rijksmuseun

I wish there to be in my house:

A woman possessing reason,

A cat among books passing by,

Friends for every season

Lacking whom I'm barely alive.

The Lion

Wild Animals

'Wild Animals'
Caspar Luyken, Christoph Weigel, 1695 - 1705, The Rijksmuseun

O lion, miserable image

Of kings lamentably chosen,

Now you're only born in a cage

In Hamburg, among the Germans.
The Hare

River Landscape with Hare

'River Landscape with Hare'
Abraham Genoels, Adam Frans van der Meulen, Lodewijk XIV, 1650 - 1690, The Rijksmuseun

Don't be fearful and lascivious

Like the hare and the amorous.

But always let your brain weave

The full form that conceives.

The Rabbit

Rabbits

'Rabbits'
Frederick Bloemaert, Abraham Bloemaert, Nicolaes Visscher (I), after 1635 - 1670, The Rijksmuseun

There's another cony I remember

That I'd so like to take alive.

Its haunt is there among the thyme

In the valleys of the Land of Tender.

The Dromedary

Four Dromedaries

'Four Dromedaries'
Nicolaes de Bruyn, 1594, The Rijksmuseun

With his four dromedaries

Don Pedro of Alfaroubeira

Travels the world and admires her.

He does what I would rather

If I'd those four dromedaries.

The Mouse

Flowers and a Mouse on an Apple

'Flowers and a Mouse on an Apple'
Assuerus van Londerseel, 1594, The Rijksmuseun

Sweet days, the mice of time,

You gnaw my life, moon by moon.

God! I've twenty eight years soon,

and badly spent ones I imagine.

The Elephant

Two Elephants

'Two Elephants'
Nicolaes de Bruyn, 1594, The Rijksmuseun

I carry treasure in my mouth,

As an elephant his ivory.

At the price of flowing words,

Purple death! . . . I buy my glory.

Orpheus

Orpheus and Eurydice

'Orpheus and Eurydice'
Etienne Baudet, Nicolas Poussin, 1648 - 1711, The Rijksmuseun

Look at this pestilential tribe

Its thousand feet, its hundred eyes:

Beetles, insects, lice

And microbes more amazing

Than the world's seventh wonder

And the palace of Rosamunde!