THE COLLECTED POEMS OF HENRIK IBSEN Translated by John ...

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Memnon’s statue, stone colossus, —
he, you know, once sang a little —
we approached, the day still young;
but the old chap held his tongue.
All that’s now mere bardic tittle
since Cambyses overhauled him,
checked his seams for wear, and mauled him,
and perhaps, who knows, reviewed the
inner organs somewhat crudely.
Many a singer’s felt such losses,
frozen voice and epiglossis.
Still, a throne’s fair compensation
for his dawn song’s deprivation.
So old Memnon’s throned in glory
on that loss-of-voice tall story,
rakes in tribute worth a mint,
holds court, dressed up, without stint,
not just for the upper classes —
even a Norwegian passes,
like your humble, and Peer Gynt.
Who, though, could record the story
of a six- or seven-week dream?
So I beg you, be a sport
and accept this scrawled report
of my trip in blazing glory
up the crocodilian stream.
Mad, to waste one’s verbal hoard
on our pasha-life aboard
our four Noah’s-ark type of vessel; —
we had four, you must remember,
with four barques besides where nestle
all the so-called weaker gender.
In the bows, then, setting forth
sat three bears from the old North;
eleven cocks from France, all mannish;
four real stallions — they were Spanish —
fiery colts quite hyperbolic,
skilled in dances cabriolic,
proud as El Olés they frolic.
We shipped service-staff besides
who, the common vote decides,
came from where the ass was stabled.
A Swiss buck of sorts moreover;
one amphibian genus labelled
“should be kept just half seas over,” —
with, of course, a crowd of rough
mast-fed (i.e. Old) Germanic
wild-boars, tame by inclination;