Take a spoonful of brackish water,
it is for balance,
then a pinch of dried reed,
two cups of duckweed,
the algae growing on wet stones
and mix it with the dust
of a single tailfeather,
that is the perfume you will wear,
that is the odour with which you shall be
announced.

To the swan,
it will smell lovely
and hateful to the human,
but your fate is sealed now, they say,
and the nose picking up on your scent
will forever be your own.
You will love your element,

and you will hate that you love your element.

Not every mirror shows your true self,
authenticity is in the eyes of the beholder.
Still, her mirror image appears as
all black plumage, she’s sharp, pale
contours softened only by shade.

Her mirror image must, then, be wrong,
she can't be so close to disappearing.
Let her mirror image, then, be gone.

This sense of transparency reduces her
to a flittering show of feathers and flight.

For everything white,
there is a glimpse of blackness.

Against a white backdrop,
the colour of her irises,
the darkness of her pupils,
the blackness of her shadow self,
mirroring her on the ground.

To possess your own shape,
she knows, that cannot be done
in whites or greys, no, only
in that one nuance,
black.

For everything white,
black.

Not every move ends on a crescendo. Some roads extend into a softer note. The way to water sounds deceptively soft in your ears, the waves are kissing your feet now, human-like. She gets on eye level with the lake, the currents stealing her words, her final goodbye is heard by no one.

But the waterfowl, the waterfowl...

Not every move has to end on a crescendo, certain kinds of motion ease into softer sounds.
The last thing she hears is the bursting of bubbles, algae in her hair, a familiar crying.
She hears the way the currents make her dance one more variation, with feet like bridges.
Crumbling.

Water washing you away is not crescending, rather you're becoming one such softer sound.

Odette thinks, the dowager queen birthed this body of water. Every wave splash is another shedding of tears. The lakeside abandoned, it is a land of no mothers. One queen knows not where to the other has disappeared. The queen (mother) knows not her daughter, the swan (queen) anymore.

Along the lakeside, footprints from webbed feet, going in circles, around and around. Where the moonlight touched the mud first, they grow slender, they grow toes. Humanity in these footprints as there is humanity in her heart. The circle complete, she steers away from the waters. Even the rain can't keep her down now, counting the hours that pass by like strangers.

From the original program, translated from the Danish.
Excerpt from the ballet, here.

Act I

The King is dead and his son, the young Prince Siegfried, faces having to seize power in the country. His friend, Benno, the Jester and the Faculty with von Rothbart at its head celebrate him as their new king. The Queen informs him that it must now be time he finds a suitable bride. In court the melancholy prince is given a crossbow as a symbol of the beginning of his adulthood.

Siegfried goes to the woods. By the lakeside he sees the most beautiful, white swan and makes ready to shoot it, but in that very moment it transforms into a woman. She tells him that she along with the other swans are bewitched; by daylight they are swans, at night they take human form again. The spell can only be broken by a man who will love her and remain true.

Siegfried and the swan princess, Odette, fall deeply in love and she asks him to take a vow of fidelity. He vows eternal loyalty to her and promises never to break his oath. Von Rothbart shows up and Odette once again becomes a swan.



Act II

Prince Siegfried must choose a wife and the Queen arranges a ball to which she invites four princesses from Hungary, Russia, Spain and Italy respectively. The princesses dance for Siegfried, but none of them are to his liking.

Von Rothbart arrives at the party and presents the Prince with his daughter, Odile, who is dressed in black, but otherwise looks wholly like Odette. Siegfried now thinks that Odile is Odette and he vows eternal loyalty to her as well. Soon the Prince realises his fateful decision and von Rothbart triumphantly leaves with Odile.

By the forest lake, the swans are saddened and try to comfort Odette. Despairingly Siegfried finds Odette to ask for mercy and in a last, loving meeting, she forgives him. But von Rothbart's evil is stronger than their love and they must succumb to his power.