Delphica, a new translation of Delfica by Gérard de Nerval – Stephan Crown-Weber

December 1, 2025

Are you acquainted, Daphne, with that old-time song
At the plane tree’s foot or under white laurel brakes,
Under olive or myrtle as the willow shakes,
That romantic ballad eternally prolonged?

Recognize the shrine with a peristyle so long—
Or bitter lemons into which your molars mashed—
And the grotto fatal to the merely rash,
The bed for seed from a dragon centuries gone?

The gods you cry for will all fly back someday.
The yet-to-come will reinstate the ancient way.
The earth beneath has trembled like a prophet’s sigh.

Yet, vaulted outward, Constantine’s arch proffers
above the sleeping Latin Sibyl of Cumae—
And the gruesome portico remains unbothered.