Paris (September 2018) Poem by Madathil Rajendran Nair
Paris (September 2018)
City of contrasts and perspectives
as the guide describes,
one is baffled where to begin:
Eiffel's rusty looks scaling into evanescent skies
eerie, metaphysical,
existential angst of Sartre and the like
at Le Café de Flore in Saint-Germain-Des-Pres,
imposing spiritual marvel of Notre Dame De Paris,
the city's celebrated night life,
Lido which I didn't see
(never visit Paris with family) ,
the pantheon of naked masculinity
at the Louvre which boasts
of Roman research into true human form
(true indeed they were in trimming to size
male genitalia to miniscule inches,
the exaggerated measure of which
had always bloated the male ego
into escapades and misadventures
unabashedly christened as world history) ,
magnificent Champs Elysees hooding up at the grand Arc de Triomphe
where an unbending De Gaulle was fictioned to have stooped
in time to save his head from Jackal's speeding bullet
or at last the great River Seine
on the banks of which
men, women and children stand
like windmills raising their arms
waving at visitors onboard midstream
as though to aliens in close encounter
(CONT.) YES, aliens were in this movie which i saw YEARS ago! Close Encounters of the Third Kind PG 1977 ‧ Drama/Science Fiction ‧ 2h 15m thanks for the tour, MN. how much do i owe you? oh, sorry, i left my wallet at home. bri :)
Yes. Close Encounters Of The Third Kind which still to-date is my my favorite SF movie! I must ask you how much do I owe you for dwelling upon my poems so elaborately. You are simply irrepressible, Bri.
(cont.) Roman research into true human form.. i thought this was about Paris. but i found: The Romans conquered the Parisii in 52 AD and they built a town on the River Seine. The Romans called Paris Lutetia. i read in The Agony and the Ecstasy, a biographical novel of Michelangelo Buonarroti, the famed sculptor, that M.B. secretly studied the anatomy of corpses to be better able to sculpt the human body. i suppose he measured EVERYTHING! (cont.)
(cont.) Le Lido is a cabaret and burlesque show located on the Champs-Élysées in Paris, ..... known for its exotic shows including dancers, singers, and other performers....exotic means strippers? ? but lido means other things. [perhaps li-bi-do comes from bi and lido, something for 'both tastes'? ] (cont.)
That is some great etymological research, Bri! You are perhaps right!
(cont.) i saw the OLD The Hunchback of Notre Dame movie and read the (long-winded, but) entertaining novel by Victor Hugo decades ago. their endings were quite different, though both Quasimodo and Esméralda were dead at the book & movie endings. it is supper time here, late in northern California. i'll try to remember to return for more commenting (and reading) later. bri :)
The Eiffel Tower is built of riveted (2.5 million rivets!) wrought iron. ...... 50 metric tons of three graded tones of paint every 7 years to protect the 200,000 square meters of iron lattice work from rust. The darkest paint is used at the bottom and the lightest shade at the top....... On occasion, the color of the paint is changed. The tower is currently painted to a shade of brown. (cont.)
Thanks Bri for all the details. All said and done, the wonder looked rusty due to the new shade of brown.
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
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4/30/2024 4:32:47 AM # 1.0.0.1119
I have never been to Paris, but your poem has shared its essence.