The palace of thunder

Through the outlet which opens on the trench in the chalk

Looking at the adverse side that seems made of nougat

You see running left and right the damp bare gully

Where has died a shovel with a frightful face with two regulation

eyes that serve to attach it under the caissons

A rat recoils in haste whilst I advance in haste

And the trench goes on crowned with chalk sown with branches

Like a hollow phantom that leaves a void where it passes palely

And overhead the roof is blue and covers well the shut eyes with

some straight lines

But on this side of the outlet is the palace quite new and looking

old

The ceiling is of railroad sleepers

Between which there are pieces of chalk and tufts of pine

needles

And from time to time chalk dust falls like fragments of age

Beside the outlet closed by a flimsy cloth of a kind which

generally serves as packing

There is a hole which takes the place of a hearth and what burns

there is a fire like the soul

It swirls so much and is so inseparable from what it consumes

and fleeting

Wires tauten everywhere serving as springs supporting the

planks

They also form hooks on which a thousand things are hung

As one does in memory

Blue haversacks blue helmets blue ties blue tunics

Pieces of sky cloth of purest memories

And there float in the air sometimes vague clouds of chalk

On the planks gleam detonation rockets jewels gilded

enamel-headed

Black white red

Tightrope walkers waiting their turn to go upon trajectories

And make a slim and elegant ornament of this subterranean

dwelling

Adorned with six beds in a horseshoe

Six beds covered with rich blue mantles

On the palace there is a high tumulus of chalk

And sheets of corrugated iron

Frozen river of this ideal domain

But deprived of water for here nothing flows but flung fire of

melinite

The park with flowers of fulminate flung from tipped-up holes

Heap of bells with sweet sounds of shining cartridges

Pines elegant and small as in a Japanese landscape

The palace is lit at times by a candle with a flame as small as a

mouse

O palace minuscule as if you looked at it from the big end of a

telescope

Little palace where everything’s new nothing nothing old

And where everything’s precious where everyone’s dressed like

a king

A saddle’s in the corner riding a box

A daily paper lies along the ground

And nevertheless everything looks old in this new dwelling

So much that you understand the love of the ancient

The taste for antiques

Comes to men from the time of caves

Everything there was so precious and so new

Everything there is so precious and so new

That a thing more ancient or which had already served appeared

there

More precious

Than what you have under your hand

In this subterranean palace hollowed out in the chalk so white

and so new

And two new steps

They’re not two weeks old

Are so old and so worn in this palace that seems antique without

imitating the antique

That you see that what is simplest and newest is that which is

Nearest to what is called antique beauty

And what is overburdened with ornaments

Needs to age to have the beauty which is called antique

And which is nobility strength ardor soul wear-and-tear

Of what is new and which serves

Above all if that is simple simple

As simple as the little palace of thunder

Guillaume Apollinaire