Mon Enfance Lyrics English translation

My childhood passed
In silent greyness
In false respectfulness
In a lack of battles.
In the winter, I was held in the belly
Of the large house
That had thrown the anchor
To the north amid the seagrass mats

In the summer, half-naked
but always modest
I would become an Indian
Somehow already certain
That my smug uncles
Had stolen the Far West from me.

My childhood passed
With women in the kitchen
Where I would dream of China
Getting older around the table
The men eating cheese,
Envelopped in clouds of tobacco
Taciturn, intelligent Flemish men
Who didn't know about me
Me, who, every night
Would kneel down for nothing
Increasing my unhappiness
At the foot of the too-big bed.
I wanted to get on a trainJacques Brel - Mon Enfance - http://motolyrics.com/jacques-brel/mon-enfance-lyrics-english-translation.html
That I had never taken.

My childhood passed
Going from one servant to another
I was already surprised
That they never stayed the same
I was surprised again
By all the family circles
How easily they went from one death to another
And by the formal mourning.
I was surprised through all of it
To be one of this flock
That taught me to cry
This flock that I knew too well.
I had the eye of a shepherd
But the heart of a sheep

And then my childhood burst open
That was adolescence
And the wall of silence
tumbled down one morning.
This was the first flower
And the first girl
The first gentleness
And the first fear.
I was flying, I swear
I swear that I was flying
My heart was opening its arms
I was no longer a barbarian

And then the war arrived.

And here we are tonight.