Antéros

Poem by Gérard De Nerval Period 19th century

You ask why I have such rage in my heart
And on a flexible neck an untamed head;
It is that I am sprung from the race of Antaeus,
I turn the darts back against the conquering god.

Yes, I am one of those inspired by the Avenger,
He marked my brow with his wrathful lip,
Beneath the paleness of Abel, alas! bloodied,
I sometimes have Cain’s implacable redness!

Jehovah! the last, vanquished by thy genius,
Who, from the depths of hell, cried: “O tyranny!”
It is my ancestor Belus or my father Dagon…
They plunged me three times into the waters of Cocytus,
And, protecting all alone my Amalekite mother,
I resow at her feet the teeth of the old dragon.

Gérard de Nerval

Translation generated by Poésies 123 with assistance from the deepseek-chat artificial-intelligence model.

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