Prayer to go to Paradise with the DonkeysWhen the time comes for me to go, Oh Lord, make sure
It’s on a feast day when the countryside is celebrating
And the wind whirling up the dust. And just as I did here below,
Let me take a road of my own choosing when I go to Paradise,
Where the stars are out in the middle of the day.
I’ll take my walking stick and I’ll take the high road
And I’ll say to my friends the donkeys,
My name is Francis Jammes and I’m going to Paradise
Because there’s no Hell in God’s good country.
And I’ll say to them, come along with me,
Dear, tender friends of the blue sky, poor dear beasts
That ward off flies, blows and bees with a flick of the ear.
And when I come, may it be in the company of these beasts of burden
I love so much because they bow their heads gently
And put their little feet together when they draw to a halt.
So sweetly and gently it goes straight to the heart.
And I’ll come followed by thousands of the ears of the ones that
Lugged wicker baskets on their flanks,
Dragged the carts of circus acrobats
Or carts with feather dusters and tin cans
Or those with battered water bidons
And she-donkeys, broken-stepped, stuffed full as goatskins
Or those they draped in pantaloons because
Of the blue suppurations made by the
Stubborn flies caked round the wounds.
Dear Lord, make sure I come to you with these donkeys
Make is so that, in all peace, angels accompany us
To bushy streams where cherries tremble like
The laughing flesh of maids
And make it so that, prostrate in this resort of souls
Now on your divine waters, I’ll be just like the donkeys
Contemplating their gentle humble poverty
In the limpidity of your eternal love.
Francis Jammes (1868-1938)
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Topic: A poem by Francis Jammes (Read 678 times)