Isaac Toussaint-Louverture
Le Passager / The Passenger
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Translation By
Carter Charles
Translator Biography
A natifnatal (native child) of Haiti, Carter Charles Assistant Professor of French and Francophone Studies at Brigham Young University. He lived for almost two decades in Bordeaux, France, where he obtained his undergraduate and graduate degrees, and taught, among other subjects, translation classes.
Publication Date
2023
Description
English translation of Isaac Toussaint-Louverture's "Le Passager, romance" by Carter Charles. Read by Isaac Kpoka.
Le Passager / The Passenger
English translation of Isaac Toussaint-Louverture's "Le Passager, romance" by Carter Charles. Read by Isaac Kpoka.
Original Work
Rives de ma terre natale,
Que de pleurs ont versés mes yeux,
Quand des vents l'haleine fatale
Marqua l'heure de nos adieux.
Emporté par ma nef légère,
Loin de l'amour et du bonheur,
A mes yeux fuyait la chaumière
De celle qui plaît à mon cœur.
Ces astres, cette autre nature,
Ces cités, ces peuples nouveaux,
Cet ennui que mon âme endure
Parmi les feux des matelots,
De ces mers l'immense barrière,
Tout me redit dans mon malheur.
Ah ! combien est loin la chaumière
De celle qui plaît à mon cœur !
J'ai connu la guerre et l'orage
Et les mœurs des bords étrangers :
Rien n'a pu ternir ton image,
Gloire, absence, plaisirs, dangers.
Tranquille au port, sur l'onde amère
Je répétais dans mon malheur :
Quand reverrai-je la chaumière
De celle qui plaît à mon cœur ?
Poem by Isaac Toussaint-Louverture
Translated Work
Oh, shorelines of my motherland,
What tears fell from my eyes
As fatal winds blew ‘cross the sand
Striking the hour of our goodbyes.
Blown asea by my sail alight,
Away from love and bliss,
As faded from sight
The hearth of the one I miss.
These stars, this strange nature,
These cities, these new faces
This pain my soul to endure
Among the sailors’ lights,
Of these seas, the vast distance,
Everything recalls my mischance.
Oh, so far from the hearth
Of the one who pleases my heart!
I have seen wars and storms
And the customs of shores foreign:
Nothing to dim your sunlit forms,
Not glory, absence, pleasures, nor perils.
Calm at the harbor, over the bitter seas
In sorrow, I kept on singing this refrain:
When shall I see again the hearth
Of the one who pleases my heart?
Translation by Carter Charles, 2023