Poem by Boris Vian - Translated by Bill Blomfield

Boris Vian (Ville D'Avray 1920-1959)
Boris Vian lived his short life with reckless exuberance and creative panache. Vigorously opposing anything which restricted freedom and constrained expression, Vian attacked all forms of control and prescription, whether religious, political or social. This rejection of constraint is evident not only in the content but also in the surreal, absurdist style of much of his writing. Vian's creativity embraced jazz (he was a talented trumpeter), song-writing, thrillers (written under the name of Vernon Sullivan), plays, surreal novels, short stories, articles and poetry.

Je Voudrais Pas Crever - Boris Vian

I don't want to crack up
Without having known
The black dogs of Mexico
Who sleep without dreaming
The monkeys with bare bums
Devourers of the tropics
The silver spiders
With nests stuffed with bubbles
I don't want to crack up
without knowing if the moon
Under her false shilling-face
Has a pointed side
If the sun is cold
If the four seasons are really only four
Without having tried
Wearing a dress
On the grand boulevards
Without having looked
into a sewer inspection-hole Without having put my prick
into some bizarre corners
I don't want to end without knowing leprosy
Or the seven maladies
One catches down there
The good nor the bad
Doesn't bother me
If if if I knew
That I would have the first of it
And there is also
All that I know
All that I value
That I know pleases me
The green depth of the sea
Where the strands of algae waltz
On the rippled sand
The baked grass of June
The crackling earth
The scent of the pines
And her kisses
Now here now there
Her beauty obvious to all
My Bear cub, Ursula
I don't want to crack up
Before having used
her mouth with my mouth
her body with my hands
the rest with my eyes
I say no more of it
It's better to stay reverential
I don't want to die
Before someone has invented
eternal roses
The work-day of two hours
The sea at the mountain
The mountain at the sea
The end of sadness
The newspapers in colour
All the children happy
And so many tricks still
Which sleep in the heads
Of genial engineers
Of jovial gardeners
Of civil citizens
And thoughtful thinkers
So many things to see
To see and to hear
So much time to spend
Searching in the night

As for me I see the swarming
End arriving
With his lousy mug
Opening for me his
Bandy toad arms

I don't want to crack up
No monsieur no madame
Before having explored
The flavour which torments me
The flavour which is the heaviest
I don't want to crack up
Before having flavoured
The taste of death.

Translator: Bill Blomfield (1912-2000)
Bill Blomfield attained degrees in science, arts, electrical engineering, medicine and psychiatry. He was a trained philosopher and psychoanalyst. Bill's translation is printed here with the kind permission of his widow Jocelyn Dunphy-Blomfield.