Jacques Bertin - The sad woman

Original Title: "La femme triste"
Year: 1996

Give me a sad woman
Rich of her disappointed loves
The house on the side of the track
The good hostess, the raw milk

Who goes back up loaded with apples
From a garden already in winter
who doesn't laughs much, who likes men
And remembers that she suffered

Give me a slow woman
Give me true silences
Give me never lieing
The true trust, the "I loved"

Clock noise hauling in the shadow
What we learn to live with !
Faithful barge that does not sink
Never your beautiful inclination so long!

Then mint leaf, old furniture
True confidences, true cafés
Beautiful and heavy like an old piece of furniture
Give yourself suddenly completely

My hand protects this lamp
Give yourself slowly and I will believe in it
There is frost on your temples
In your eyes rises a tide

Everything lies, you know from going too fast
O the sighs never soared!
I absolve your sadness, I hesitate
Give me this veiled voice

Of the wrong that has been done to you formerly
You will talk to me, your lovers
or you will be quiet, then the war
You will talk. Everything that lies

The cannonades in the plain
The handsome boys, the brass bands
behind the curtain of sorrows
O miracle of abandonements

The coat in the water, the widowhood
Throw your age in this bal
Make a vine shoot of your hurt
To burn take your torments

Léo Ferré - It Fits You

Original Title: "ça t'va"
Year: 1962

You never go to the collections
You prefer to put your money flat in front of you
To buy yourself a beautiful house
Wrapped by Dior's of gothic
But as one can not go ass all bare
And then me I'd not want to
You dress yourself at a couturier of your own devising
that has affordable harnesses

It fits you
This hundred francs dress
Your messed up hair
That nothing that dresses you up

It fits you
Your pointy shoes
Even if they are knackered
It flatters your legs

It fits you
This lizard handbag
That gets a tan
Under its plastic looks

It fits you
That unprentious way
You have taken my name
To live of music

You never go at Rubinstein
That has sweet little face in tablet
Who for a long time will stage
The mug of the ladies for parade
And when you go out to the stuck-ups
And I ask you if you are ready
You say with your anarchist look:
"Me I have the sun on the facade"

It fits you
That ten francs mug
Despite what would say
The stupid photographs

It fits you
That back that goes down
Under the indecent eye
of the guys that are watching out for you

It fits you
Your wet windows
When they have watched
The joy that unwinds

It fits you
Your hands all like that
by that I do not know what
that makes the mother hens

You never go to the collections
You prefer to sew a little happiness
In our square and make your hole
Far from the nerds and their system
You are there until the end of times
Writing me the problem page
You let go of me just for me to have enough time
to make a song and tell you that I love you

It's fine by me
Your golden prison
Your adored mouth
by way of lock

It's fine by me
Your simmered dishes
so well that it feels like
eating some lust

It's fine by me
Your blessed look
that have the lovers
who remain faithful

It's fine by me
That one could say one day
"As for love
he only loved her"

Serge Reggiani - Paul's song

Original Title: "La Chanson de Paul"
Year: 1975

This evening, I drink!
You can still turn the light off
And your white hand gliding on the rail
Go up to your bedroom
To look for your dark sleep
Me, I stay downstairs tonight
And I drink!

Yes. I promised
Yes, I'm still drinking anyway!
Go! I love you.
Go away in your night

I drink...
To the women who didn't love me
To the children I didn't have
But to you who wanted of me
I drink...
To those houses that I left
To the friends who made me fall
But to you who kissed me
But to you who kissed me

That evening
We were coming out of the cinema
The weather was bad
In the Vivienne street
I was very elegant
I was wearing my fur-lined jacket
You, you had your red coat
And I see your mouth again
Like a fruit under the rain
Like a fruit under the rain

This evening, I drink!
Thankfully, I am never drunk.
Sleep...Tonight, I will write my book.
It's time, it's been ages
It's my novel, it's my story
There are things you only write
only when it's very late
only when it's well into the night
Sleep, I love you
Sleep, in my life

I drink...
To the letters I didn't write
To bastards who deserve them
But I don't remember where they live
I drink...
To all the ideas I had
I drink to the ideas who got me
But to you who defended me
But to you who defended me

That day,
In a café of the 15th
You told me: "I love you"
I wasn't listening
There was a whole team
We were talking politics
I fight with a guy
And you took me away
Like a wounded child
Like a wounded child

I drink
To the combat you lead
To take me away from the party
Tonight, I drink to your defeat
I drink
To the time spent cursing you
making you laugh, cherishing you
To the time spent aging you

I drink...
To the women who didn't love me
To the children I didn't have
But to you who wanted of me
But to you who wanted of me

Monique Morelli - Villon - I pity the time of my youth

Original Title: "Je plains le temps de ma jeunesse"
Text: François Villon
Music: Lino Léonardi
Year: 1974

I pity the time of my youth
During which I have enjoyed more than others
Until the entrance of old age
That has its advancement concealed
It did not go on foot
Nor on horseback: Alas! How then?
Suddenly has flown away
And didn't leave me any gift

Gone has been and I remain
Poor of sense and knowledge
Sad, failed, more black than moor
Who has no sense, income has not
The least of my own, I speak the truth,
Commits himself to disown me
Forgetting natural duty
For lack of a little inheritance
For lack of a little inheritance

Eh! God, if I had studied
At the time of my crazy youth
And to good morals dedicated
I would have house and soft bed
But what? I fled school
Like does the bad child
While writing this word
Close for my heart to break
Close for my heart to break

My days have gone wandering
Like, says Job, of a tablecloth
Make the nets, when weaver
in his fist holds a burning straw
When if he has no end that sticks out
Suddenly he robs it
If I do not fear that anything assaults me anymore
Because in death everything is satisfied
Because in death everything is satisfied

Léo Ferré - Aragon - You won't come back from it

Original Title: "Tu n'en reviendras pas"
Text: Louis Aragon (1956)
Year: 1959

You won't come back you from it you who ran after the girls
Young man who I have seen the heart beating exposed
When I teared your shirt and neither you
You won't come back from it old Manille player

whom a shell cut in two sideways
For once he had a sensational game
And you the tatooed, the former legionnaire
You will survive a long time without face, without eyes

We leave God knows to where, it's of a bad dream
We will glide along the line of fire
Somewhere it's starting to not be a game anymore
The good men there are waiting for replacements

Roll in the distance, roll train of the last glows
The soldiers asleep that your dance shakes
Let the forehead lean and bend their neck
It smells of tobocco breath and sweat

How to look at you without seeing your fates
Bethroted to the earth and promised to pains
The night-light gives you the color of tears
You vaguely move your condemned legs

Already the stone thinks where your name is written
Already you are no more than a golden word on our squares
Already the memory of your love fades away
Already you only exist for having perished

Barbara's version:


Catherine Sauvage's version:


All poems written by Louis Aragon

Léo Ferré - Rutebeuf - Poor Rutebeuf

Original Title: "Pauvre Rutebeuf"
Text: adapted from several poems by Rutebeuf (XIIIth century)
Year: 1956

What has become of my friends
whom I held so close
And loved so much
They have been too scarce
I believe the wind took them off
Love is dead
Those are friends that wind takes away
And the wind was blowing in front of my door
And took them away

With weather that defoliates the trees
when there are in branches no more leaves left
which do not fall down to the ground
With poverty that appals me
that, from everywhere, wages war against me
At the time of winter
It's not suitable for me to tell you
How I shamed myself
In which way

What has become of my friends
whom I held so close
And loved so much?
They have been too scarce
I believe the wind took them off
Love is dead
The evil can not come alone
All that had to come to me
happened to me

Poor sense and poor memory
has God given to me, the King of glory
and poor income
And straight to the ass when north wind blows
the wind comes to me, the wind airs me
Love, she is dead
Those are friends that wind takes away
And the wind was blowing in front of my door
Took them away

Hope of tomorrows are my feasts

Jacques Douai's version:

Cora Vaucaire's version:

Cora Vaucaire "Que sont mes amis devenus ?" par ina

Jacques Douai - Luc Bérimont - I am closer to you

Original Title: "Je suis plus près de toi"
Text: "Luc Bérimont"
Music: "Lise Médini"
Year: 1964

I plant a dry tree in the belly of the fire
The worn wick of the day blackens under the rain
The evening's noises are born. I hear the oxen come in
The pendulum has ground minutes of soot

I'm closer to you
Who confuses the route
And who lets my voice
Drift on the ponds

I'm closer to you
Than the wind in the towers
Than the disgust of the days
which sits at the table and taunts me

I will know from now on how to suffer from love
Lost on the edge of the meadows in the muds of fall
I knew the sorrow in Paris in the yards
It's well a similar pain, a similar trick

I'm closer to you
Who confuses the route
And who lets my voice
Drift on the ponds

I'm closer to you
Than the wind in the towers
Than the disgust of the days
Which sits at the table and taunts me

Winter is a dead king feathered with crows
He opens, he was expecting me, he laughs at me like a brother
The bedrooms are adorned with a checker of old bones
The age I have tonight weights like a stone

I'm closer to you
Who confuses the route
And who lets my voice
Drift on the ponds

I'm closer to you
Than the wind in the towers
Than the disgust of the days
Which sits at the table and taunts me

Jacques Bertin's version:

Léo Ferré - Louis Aragon - I sing to pass the time

Original title: "Je chante pour passer le temps"
Text: Louis Aragon (1956)
Year: 1959

I sing to pass the time
short amount of it that I have left to live
Like you draw on the frost
Like you make your heart pleased
while throwing pebbles on the pond
I sing to pass the time

I have lived marvels during the day
You and I, remember it
And I have broken through the wall of the years
The ears full of miracles
Our universe is not the same anymore
I have lived marvels during the day

Let's have those fingers untangled now
Like the forehead from the glory
Our eyes were first to see
the clouds lower than us
And the lark at our knees
Let's have those fingers untangled now

We have made moonlights
For our palaces and our statues
What matters now that we are being killed
The nights will fall one by one
China turned itself into the Commune
We have made moonlights

And I would tell and I would tell
So much was this life adventure
Where man has become life-size
His voice above the forests
The mountains, the seas and the secrets
And I would tell and I would tell

Yes; I sing to pass the time
The bow wears out against the violin
The pebble at the game of rebounds
And how my love is touching
Near me in the leaning shadow
Yes, I sing to pass the time

I sing to pass the time
Yes to pass the time I sing

Philippe Léotard's version:


All poems written by Louis Aragon