‘Abîme des oiseaux’

Abstract

Clarinet solo. The abyss is Time, with its sorrows and its weariness. The birds are the opposite of Time; they are our desire for light, for stars, for rainbows and joyful songs! Messiaen's interpretation of the scriptures here is illuminating, insofar as it can be reconstructed from these brief remarks. Ian Matheson has suggested that the ‘abyss’ refers to a passage in Revelation 11:7, in which ‘the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against [the two prophets], and shall overcome them, and kill them’. This vision is treated more fully in Revelation 9:1–6, where the abyss (or ‘bottomless pit’ in the King James version) is opened by the fifth Angel of the apocalypse: [v. 1:] And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven unto the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit. [v. 2:] And he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose a smoke out of the pit … [v. 3:] And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth: and unto them was given power … [v. 4:] And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads, [v. 5:] And to them it was given that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months … [v. 6] And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them.