This card is rather like a funny valentine, showing a person, with a verse. And in fact the festivities of Poisson d`Avril did seem to encourage men and women with a hidden fancy for each other to make them the object of ridicule, in the hope that desire may follow.
The idea seems to have been either to put these cards through the door of someone who you thought radiated the qualities on the card, or to pin them on their person as an alternative to just a paper fish.
There are men and women, and so far we know of :
- female in red blouse with basket
- female in red coat with humped shoulders
- female in white dress with large collar
- male in brown coat, rather artistic
- male with beard, rather unkempt
- male with cane to mouth
- male with devil`s horns
- male with lemon squeezer hat
and the verses are humorous - for example, ours reads : "Je voudrais pour parer la grace, A l`heure ou l`Aurore eveille les roses, Mettre un doux baiser our les leines (?) cloves (?) , Comme la guepe our certaine chose grasse" That seems to translate to "I would like to take your grace, at the hour when Dawn awakens the roses, to place a sweet kiss on the lean cloves, like the wasp on a certain fat thing." - but some parts don`t seem to fit.. .I`ll tinker with it later.