Pater noster [English translation]

Our Father who are in Heaven,

just stay there.

And we, we will remain on Earth,

which is sometimes so nice,

with it's New York mysteries,

its Paris mysteries too,

which are well worth the ones of the Trinity.

With its small Ourcq1 canal,

its Great Wall of China,

its river near Morlaix2,

its bêtises de Cambrai3

with its Pacific Ocean

and its two ponds in the Tuilleries garden.

With its good kids and its naughty boys

with all its wonders of the world

which sit there,

simply here on earth,

free for everybody,

scattered,

wondering themselves for being such marvels,

not daring to realize it,

like a naked pretty girl wouldn't dare to show herself.

With the horrible plagues of the world

which are legions,

with their legionaries,

with their torturers,

with the masters of this world,

the masters with their priests, their traitors, their mercenaries

with the seasons

with the years

with the pretty girls and the old farts

with the hay of misery rotting in the steel of the guns.

1. A canal in the North of Paris2. A town in French Brittany3. A kind of sweets whose name means "silly things"

• Artist:Jacques Prévert