Will new and alive the beautiful today
shatter with a blow of a drunken wing
this hard lake, forgotten, haunted under rime
by the transparent glacier, flights unflown!
A swan of long ago remembers now that he,
magnificent but lost to hope is doomed
for having failed to sing the realms of life
when the ennui of sterile winter gleamed.
His neck will shake off the white torment space
inflicts upon the bird for his denial,
but not this horror, plumage trapped in ice.
Phantom by brilliance captive to this place,
immobile, he assumes disdain's cold dream,
which, in his useless exile, robes the swan.
Translated by Patricia Terry and Maurice Shroder