The Wax Lady

I watched the mannequin turning round,

Admiring her figure, her bosom fair,

Her golden hair, her teasing little face,

When suddenly I saw her nostril quiver

And her slender neck of viper-like form.

"She lives, then!" I told myself in terror.

And ever since, haunted at every hour

By a love that nothing can destroy,

I have both the fear and the curiosity

Of seeing the wax lady enter my home.

In every weather, beneath an African sky,

Or under clouds uneasy and forlorn,

Like a swimmer pursued by a shark,

Unable to flee, I remain before her display window,

And there I hear my heart beating like a drum.

Though I tell myself, "Horror! Madness!"

There are nights of dreadful darkness—

—So much do I summon her, so much do I desire her!—

When I can imagine it possible

That the wax lady might enter my home.

Just as she is, in her nankeen dress,

With eyes the color of aquamarine,

And that alluring, mischievous smile,

The spinning beauty with crimson lips

Settles herself into my brain and engraves herself there.

I willingly hallucinate her,

And, drunk on strangeness, sink deeper

Into a fog that my reason strives to tear apart,

For it is my most ardently cherished dream

To see the wax lady enter my home.

Maurice Rollinat, 1883