Clark Atlanta University

Flute PlayersAuthor(s): Jean Joseph Rabearivelo and Langston HughesReviewed work(s):Source: Phylon (1940-1956), Vol. 15, No. 4 (4th Qtr., 1954), pp. 363-364Published by: Clark Atlanta UniversityStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/272845 .Accessed: 15/09/2012 15:54

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TALKING DRUMS TALKING DRUMS

do today? ('When a pretty girl comes to dance, how shall the singer prepare for her?') He who sits on the (royal) stool, Lion of lions, Chief, it is of him that I worry; the leopard and the Chief are no plaything! He who is fitted for the kingship, let him be king! It is God who makes the King!

By JEAN JOSEPH RABIARIVELO

(Translated by Langston Hughes)

Flute Players (Flutistes)

Your flute,

you carved from the shin bone of a strong bull

and you polished it on barren hills beaten by sun.

His flute,

he carved from a reed trembling in the breeze

and cut its little holes beside a flowing brook

drunk on dreams of moonlight.

Together

you made music in the late afternoon

as if to hold back the round boat

sinking on the shores of the sky,

as if to save it from its fate:

but are your plaintive incantations

heard by the gods of the wind,

and of the earth, and of the forest,

and of the sand?

do today? ('When a pretty girl comes to dance, how shall the singer prepare for her?') He who sits on the (royal) stool, Lion of lions, Chief, it is of him that I worry; the leopard and the Chief are no plaything! He who is fitted for the kingship, let him be king! It is God who makes the King!

By JEAN JOSEPH RABIARIVELO

(Translated by Langston Hughes)

Flute Players (Flutistes)

Your flute,

you carved from the shin bone of a strong bull

and you polished it on barren hills beaten by sun.

His flute,

he carved from a reed trembling in the breeze

and cut its little holes beside a flowing brook

drunk on dreams of moonlight.

Together

you made music in the late afternoon

as if to hold back the round boat

sinking on the shores of the sky,

as if to save it from its fate:

but are your plaintive incantations

heard by the gods of the wind,

and of the earth, and of the forest,

and of the sand?

363 363

PHYLON

Your flute

throws out a beat like the march of an angry bull

toward the desert

but who comes back running,

burned by thirst and hunger and defeated by weariness

at the foot of a shadeless tree

with neither leaves nor fruit.

His flute

is like a reed that bends

beneath the weight of a bird in flight -

but not a bird captured by a child

whose feathers are stroked,

but a bird lost from other birds

who looks at his own shadow for company in the flowing water.

Your flute

and his-

regret their beginnings

in the sorrows of your songs.

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364