This is a random poetry generator based on nine different translations of Anne Hébert’s celebrated poem, “The Tomb of Kings.” The code was written by Kris Shaffer and available on GitHub (minus the poetry files). Consider this site a companion piece to my larger research project, A Journey in Translation: Anne Hébert’s Poetry in English, to be published in August by University of Ottawa Press. See below for references.

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The Tomb of Kings

My carry my heart on my fist
like a blind falcon

This taciturn bird gripping my fingers
A swollen lamp of wine and blood
I descend
Toward the tomb of kings
Astonished
Scarcely born.

What thread of Ariadne leads me
Along the muted labyrinth?
The echo of footfall is swallowed there step by step.

(In what dream
Was this child tied by her ankle
Like a fascinated slave?)

The maker of the dream
Pulls the thread
And the naked footfalls come
One by one
Like the first drops of rain
At the bottom of the well.

Already the odour stirs in swollen storms
Seeps from the sills of doors
Of secret, round chambers,
Where the confined beds are stiffly erect.

The motionless desire of effigies moves me.
I behold with astonishment
Encrusted upon black bones
The blue stones gleaming

A few tragedies, patiently carved out
On the chests of kings, are displayed
In the guise of jewels
Are offered me
Without tears or regret.

In a single rank arrayed:
The smoke of incense, the cake of dry rice
And my quivering flesh:
Ritual and submissive offering.

The golden mask on my absent face
Violet flowers for eyes,
The shadow of love pains my face with careful needle- strokes;
And this bird I have breathes
And complains strangely.

A long shudder
Like a wind rising, from tree to tree,
Shakes the seven tall ebony Pharoahs
In their solemn, ornate encasings.

Only the depths of death persists,
Feigning the last torment
Looking for appeasement
And its eternity
In a slight clinking of bracelets
Vain hoops, alien games
Around the sacrificed flesh

Avid for the fraternal source of evil in me,
They lay me down, they drink me;
Seven times I know the tight grip of the bones
And the dry hand seeking my heart to break it.

Livid and satiated with the horrible dream
My limbs set free
And the dead thrown out of me, assassinated,
What glimmer of dawn strays in here?
Wherefore does this bird quiver
And turn toward dawn
Its blinded eyes?

The poems are from the following publications:

F.R. Scott, translator, St-Denys Garneau and Anne Hébert, Klanak Press, 1962
Peter Miller, translator, The Tomb of Kings, Contact Press, 1967
F.R. Scott, translator, Dialogue sur la traduction, HMH, 1970
Alan Brown, translator, Poems by Anne Hébert, Musson, 1975
F.R. Scott, translator, Poems of French Canada, Blackfish Press, 1977
Kathleen Weaver, translator, The Penguin Book of Women Poets, 1979
Willis Barnstone, translator, A Book of Women Poets from Antiquity to Now, 1980
Janis L. Pallister, translator, Sinuous Laces, 1986
Alfred Poulin Jr., translator, Anne Hébert: Selected Poems, 1987