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Fiction

The Sea Horses’ Ball

By Boris Gamaleya
Translated from French by Alexis Pernsteiner & Antoine Bargel
Boris Gamaleya’s cryptic “Sea Horses’ Ball” speaks of sea and sky, crashing planes and forgotten loves, mountain ranges and creatures of the deep.

Below the Mipham plane the Himalayan sky. The wind florifies the snow. Fa-fa-mi . . . mi-fa-fa   . . . Shadows gain in luxuriance, tufts of omphalodes and orthosiphon.

Don’t stay grounded. Don’t stay attached to anything. My word as a stewardess! In order to thank the Black Virgin and brush her by a breath in her orchard of light, the plane loses some altitude. And to allow the amphibians of outerlava to turn their faces toward the wheel of Virgil.

Rain or shine, the plane dives straight toward a strip of shards. Power of the Samadhi. With a ravishing hand, serve us a finger of “Sunday” spirit or of more feminine, lunar rose, tear of an epitaph . . .

Are we called back to reason? I hear it from the golden cabin where a pack of stilnox sits among the magazines.

Your attention . . . And the stewardess—a chewing-gum beauty tasting like jus d’orange in salivated syllables:

Don’t be a-fraid—there is no storm an-nounced—except an ounce of jazz—committed by an in-visible gentle-man—to make his income burst —

Eas-ter forgi-veness and sa-cri-fice—O-bit—a squall passes—the size of an India with fer-vent wise life—bet-ween the or-bi-tals—eve-ry-one finds their bea-rings—river tears of salt—happiness—night nomadic thought—sea bit-ter me-lon—birds dis-sec-ted—dews strung on hol-ly-hock ar-ches—the hand that you give me—the road to the last hut—and quickly said—quickly done—the abyss of shearwaters and the pier of roosters . . .

Passengers need naps—other tone from her—I worry that you cannot take me for your dream—a terracotta lie that molds fairies on the mountain. Leaving—coming back. Coming back—leaving. We put you back home . . .

Home? I have a memory of running away from an old shed. God tells me he doesn’t have enough stars anymore to make the night of my happiness. So—I suggest to him—if the starry islands are not the end of the journey—some rock of solar isolario—have me born a vague moon of the bulkhead continent made from that limbo where Eurydice is looking for Orpheus.

A character in a dramatic story, the road at last uncovers its lucky star. Of which sentence, dear friends, are you still prisoners? Our heart only remembers a gray sky of arranged matarum.

By this flight we will kiss the touching foot or the embroidered altar cloth—signs that the goddess may use to guide us to other worlds.

The mountain at a stop hesitates to dissolve in inexpressible odysseys. That would be much more than a fun-and-games avalanche. Let’s go, warm heart! We have everything to gain—the heart of God—tears or squalls dancing in rain showers. No? Are we standing our ground? In any case, the cause is complete. I do not care about your choice . . .

The plane crashes . . . on the island of troubling roosters.

Better than Ratatata (and than the molar bites of the hounds in the news . . .) it strikes well, between Altar and Balance, the ear of the wolf-shark with a look of blue gold—left behind by somnolent depths.

Between city and summit, nothing left to collect. As for things, nothing to say, the mailmen of unity have already bent over backwards. What shifting of wings could have—barely—saved the “Trunk of God” from the superburst tree? To continue one’s text for the night, is it not from their shirt to dislodge the daturas—and scatter them in moon petals along the beaches? In the end, let the goal come on its own.  Like an eternity before the end. Will you tell me where flew the soul that was one with such a host of untold places between death and resurrection?

“Je t’aime” . . . The ark’s entrance in the invisible creek. Dream-memory? The toads are quiet now. I have forgotten your face—to the point of not being able to cry over it anymore. I have forgotten this so loved—to the point of breaking it down. It drowned on the reef—flowers of foam—in its own reflection. A peaceful wind clears the last shots.

Far from the racket of ambulances—big planes take off from the shelter of ramparts—forming with continents—over hill and net—an archipelago. Yes, they are still up to it! I will end my sleep in another bed—climb the last pangs of ice—hear the rustle of souls packed up in their ark body—collect the choregi from the country of Floreo-of-the-Frogs (swiss . . . swiss . . .) and of the lunatic Pierrot of Mario Pagliarini (Lord-the-sea thank you for this happiness)—seek the starry sting of Lalibela, both king and queen of bumblebees—overflow with a love of lights mixed with downpours of gold. 

English

Below the Mipham plane the Himalayan sky. The wind florifies the snow. Fa-fa-mi . . . mi-fa-fa   . . . Shadows gain in luxuriance, tufts of omphalodes and orthosiphon.

Don’t stay grounded. Don’t stay attached to anything. My word as a stewardess! In order to thank the Black Virgin and brush her by a breath in her orchard of light, the plane loses some altitude. And to allow the amphibians of outerlava to turn their faces toward the wheel of Virgil.

Rain or shine, the plane dives straight toward a strip of shards. Power of the Samadhi. With a ravishing hand, serve us a finger of “Sunday” spirit or of more feminine, lunar rose, tear of an epitaph . . .

Are we called back to reason? I hear it from the golden cabin where a pack of stilnox sits among the magazines.

Your attention . . . And the stewardess—a chewing-gum beauty tasting like jus d’orange in salivated syllables:

Don’t be a-fraid—there is no storm an-nounced—except an ounce of jazz—committed by an in-visible gentle-man—to make his income burst —

Eas-ter forgi-veness and sa-cri-fice—O-bit—a squall passes—the size of an India with fer-vent wise life—bet-ween the or-bi-tals—eve-ry-one finds their bea-rings—river tears of salt—happiness—night nomadic thought—sea bit-ter me-lon—birds dis-sec-ted—dews strung on hol-ly-hock ar-ches—the hand that you give me—the road to the last hut—and quickly said—quickly done—the abyss of shearwaters and the pier of roosters . . .

Passengers need naps—other tone from her—I worry that you cannot take me for your dream—a terracotta lie that molds fairies on the mountain. Leaving—coming back. Coming back—leaving. We put you back home . . .

Home? I have a memory of running away from an old shed. God tells me he doesn’t have enough stars anymore to make the night of my happiness. So—I suggest to him—if the starry islands are not the end of the journey—some rock of solar isolario—have me born a vague moon of the bulkhead continent made from that limbo where Eurydice is looking for Orpheus.

A character in a dramatic story, the road at last uncovers its lucky star. Of which sentence, dear friends, are you still prisoners? Our heart only remembers a gray sky of arranged matarum.

By this flight we will kiss the touching foot or the embroidered altar cloth—signs that the goddess may use to guide us to other worlds.

The mountain at a stop hesitates to dissolve in inexpressible odysseys. That would be much more than a fun-and-games avalanche. Let’s go, warm heart! We have everything to gain—the heart of God—tears or squalls dancing in rain showers. No? Are we standing our ground? In any case, the cause is complete. I do not care about your choice . . .

The plane crashes . . . on the island of troubling roosters.

Better than Ratatata (and than the molar bites of the hounds in the news . . .) it strikes well, between Altar and Balance, the ear of the wolf-shark with a look of blue gold—left behind by somnolent depths.

Between city and summit, nothing left to collect. As for things, nothing to say, the mailmen of unity have already bent over backwards. What shifting of wings could have—barely—saved the “Trunk of God” from the superburst tree? To continue one’s text for the night, is it not from their shirt to dislodge the daturas—and scatter them in moon petals along the beaches? In the end, let the goal come on its own.  Like an eternity before the end. Will you tell me where flew the soul that was one with such a host of untold places between death and resurrection?

“Je t’aime” . . . The ark’s entrance in the invisible creek. Dream-memory? The toads are quiet now. I have forgotten your face—to the point of not being able to cry over it anymore. I have forgotten this so loved—to the point of breaking it down. It drowned on the reef—flowers of foam—in its own reflection. A peaceful wind clears the last shots.

Far from the racket of ambulances—big planes take off from the shelter of ramparts—forming with continents—over hill and net—an archipelago. Yes, they are still up to it! I will end my sleep in another bed—climb the last pangs of ice—hear the rustle of souls packed up in their ark body—collect the choregi from the country of Floreo-of-the-Frogs (swiss . . . swiss . . .) and of the lunatic Pierrot of Mario Pagliarini (Lord-the-sea thank you for this happiness)—seek the starry sting of Lalibela, both king and queen of bumblebees—overflow with a love of lights mixed with downpours of gold. 

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