Offering to Pan | This cup of wood as black as a pip

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by Anna Elizabeth Mathieu, Comtesse de Noailles (1876 - 1933)

Translation © by Corinne Orde

Offrande à Pan

Language: French (Français)

Our translations: ENG

Cette tasse de bois noire comme un pépin,
Où j'ai su d'une lame insinuante et dure,
Sculpter habilement la feuille du raisin
Avec son pli, ses noeuds, sa vrille et sa frisure,

Je la consacre à Pan en souvenir du jour
Où le berger Damis m'arrachant cette tasse,
Après que j'y eus bu, vint y boire à son tour
En riant de me voir rougir de son audace.

Ne sachant où trouver l'autel du dieu cornu
Je laisse mon offrande au creux de cette roche . . .
Mais maintenant mon coeur a le goût continu
D'un baiser plus profond, plus durable et plus proche . . .

Text Authorship:

by Anna Elizabeth Mathieu, Comtesse de Noailles (1876 - 1933), "Offrande à Pan", written 1901, appears in Le Cœur innombrable, Paris, Éd. Calmann-Lévy, first published [1901] [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

by Louis Vierne (1870 - 1937), "Offrande à Pan", op. 60 no. 1 (1930), published 1946, first performed 1932 [ voice, harp ], from Quatre Poèmes Grecs, no. 1, Éd. Salabert [sung text checked 1 time]

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

ENG English (Corinne Orde) , "Offering to Pan", copyright © 2008, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this page: Geoffrey Wieting

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 12
Word count: 108

Offering to Pan

Language: English after the French (Français)

This cup of wood as black as a pip,
On which, with a hard and insinuating blade,
I was able skilfully to sculpt the grape leaf,
With its fold, its nodes, its tendrils and its curls,

I dedicate it to Pan in remembrance of the day
When the shepherd Damis, seizing this cup from me,
After I had drunk from it, drank from it in his turn,
While laughing to see me blush at his audacity.

Not knowing where to find the altar of the horned god,
I leave my offering in the hollow of this rock . . .
But now my heart has the constant taste
Of a kiss that is deeper, longer lasting and closer . . .

Text Authorship:

Translation from French (Français) to English copyright © 2008 by Corinne Orde, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you may ask the copyright-holder(s) directly or ask us; we are authorized to grant permission on their behalf. Please provide the translator's name when contacting us.
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Based on:

a text in French (Français) by Anna Elizabeth Mathieu, Comtesse de Noailles (1876 - 1933), "Offrande à Pan", written 1901, appears in Le Cœur innombrable, Paris, Éd. Calmann-Lévy, first published [1901]
- Go to the text page.

This text was added to the website: 2008-01-21
Line count: 12
Word count: 121