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Francis LEDER
Gold Rush
With the rhymes of "INVOCATION"
By François-René de CHATEAUBRIAND
To dream of the Klondike, you have to be ingenuous
Or else naive, to go off into the unknown,
Believe in korrigans or fountain spirits,
To cross so many deserts, mountains, plains
Pursuing the chimera of a precious metal!
How many were there, with their eyes raised to the heavens,
To hope for luck and “Mother Nature”?
Fascinated as they were, by the pure substance,
Many of them were at their expense.
Some of them ended up living in the forest,
Virtually returned to the wild,
Exposed to hunger, cold and storms.
Their story is certainly poignant, even touching.
And it would be very edifying to make a song out of it.
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