Giraf(f)e

Deep in my archive there is this giraffe.  I honestly don’t know anymore where it came from (it was taken before I started to properly organise all my photos, it’s my own fault). Maybe there was a giraffe lurking nearby creating this shadowy reflection on the window. Maybe it was something else.  It was my most grievous fault not to notice.

There is something lurking in my memory archives.  A French poem by Jacques Prévert.

Mea Culpa

C’est ma faute
C’est ma faute
C’est ma très grande faute d’orthographe
Voilà comment j’écris
Giraffe.

The poem relies on the fact that giraffe is spelled with only one f in French: girafe.  So his fault was not actually a fault, just spelling in a different language.  I have found translations neither in English nor in German, which is unusual because it is a well known poem and because of it outward simplicity and brevity often used in French language classes.  The difficulty in translation is not only that “girafe” is “giraffe/Giraffe” in either language.  Together with the fact that the poem is built on the Confiteor as used in the celebration of Roman Catholic mass and the Latin mea culpa is translated into French as c’est ma faute (it’s my fault) but in English it’s “through my fault” (because of the Latin ablative, the same problem occurs in German) and that makes a translation as a poem with the same depth impossible.

A literal translation would be:

Mea Culpa

It’s my fault
It’s my fault
It’s my most grievous orthographical fault
Here is how I wrote
Girafe.

Linked to Friendly Friday Challenge: Unusual.