Octavia McBride-Ahebee: Sèche Tes Pleurs by Bernard Dadiè

Monday, April 2, 2012

Sèche Tes Pleurs by Bernard Dadiè

T. S. Eliot

Ivorian writer Bernard Dadiè’s poem Sèche Tes Pleurs was translated into Mende and set to music by American composer John Williams for the Steven Spielberg movie The Amistad. Below is the poem in French as Dadiè originally wrote it. What follows is a video of the poem being sung in Mende and the English translation.

Sèche Tes Pleurs

By Bernard Dadiè

Sèche tes pleurs Afrique!
Tes enfants te reviennent
dans l’orage et la tempête des voyages infructueux.
Sur le ris de l’onde et le babil de la brise,
Sur l’or des levants
Et la pourpre des couchants
des cimes des monts orgueilleux
Et des savanes abreuvées de lumière
Ils te reviennent
dans l’orage et la tempête des voyages infructueux.
Sèche tes pleurs, Afrique
Ayant bu
À toutes les fontaines
d’infortune
et de gloire,
Nos sens se sont ouverts
à la splendeur de ta beauté
à la senteur de tes forêts,
à l’enchantement de tes eaux
à la limpidité de ton ciel
à la caresse de ton soleil
Et au charme de ta verdure emperlée de rosée.
Sèche tes pleurs, Afrique!
Tes enfants te reviennent
Les mains pleines de jouets
Et le coeur plein d’amour.
Ils reviennent te vêtir
De leurs rêves et de leurs espoirs.

Légendes et poèmes. Paris: Seghers, 1973

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-Lillian Dunn, Editor of Apiary Literary Journal

Octavia McBride-Ahebee

Words without Borders; The Home of International Literature

Monday, April 2, 2012

Sèche Tes Pleurs by Bernard Dadiè

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