I
What city and what night
since it’s night in the city
when a woman and a train-station argue over
the same half of a man who is leaving.
He is young, handsome
he is leaving for a piece of white bread.
She is young, beautiful as a springtime
cluster
trying to flower for the last time
for her man who is leaving.
But the train arrives
but the branch breaks
but suddenly it’s raining in the station
in the midst of spring.
And the train emerges from all directions
It whistles and goes right through the woman
the whole length of her.
Where the woman bleeds, there will never be spring
Again.
in the night, in her head, under the pillow
trains pass filled with men
filled with mud
and they all go through her
the whole length of them.
How many winters will pass, how many snowfalls
before the first bleeding letter
before the first mouthful of white bread?
II
Perhaps it’s the same city
but a different solitude
another road of rain
A child is walking down the empty street
he follows another child
who is following a dog
who follows another dog
who is following an odor of bread.
The closer he comes to the smell
the further away the whiff of bread seems
flutters
circles in the air
then suddenly climbs to perch
on the streetlight
like a moth
And the two little boys
and the two little dogs
at the naked foot of the streetlight
stay, open-mouthed
in a circle of light.
And it’s the same night
and it’s the same solitude
and it’s the same child
in the same street
in the same circle of streetlights.
Now on his cheek hunger
has deepened
the furrow traced by tears.
Now with his scrawny limbs
he drags a pauper’s toy:
a cardboard box
and in it a skinny little dog
and a patched-together childhood.
It makes a peculiar little noise
that patched-up childhood dragged
along the pavement.
But the child listens to the night
and dreams with all his hunger
that he has become a sailor
his carton a ship which floats
carrying his childhood far away
which becomes a bird
in one wing-beat.
IV
What a woman, what a departure!
She has named her fear
she has measured its feet
then she measured her own mouth
then rose up in one movement.
She goes through the glass city
goes from door to door
she speaks
and now nothing can stop her.
She speaks of all nights
and all women
she speaks of the sea
of waves which carry everything away
as if everything could be carried away
of waves which begin the sea again
there where the sea stopped.
She goes through the city
she walks with death
hand in hand
and her hand does not tremble…
She speaks all around your skull
and what a laugh would burst from her throat, that woman
if, at the wall’s base, Shahrayar arose!
VII
That woman who walks on the horizon
who has always been walking
who has been walking since she no longer had legs to walk with
That woman with no smile and no regrets
no illusions, walking towards her plot of blue sky
does she know that time is no longer at her stopping-point?
That time is no longer there to grant forgiveness?
Is no longer waiting in front of the tree
which neither lives nor dies?
Does she know, that woman walking towards her plot of blue sky
that the taste of the sky has changed
that the sky is black and that the ocean
the bright and joyous ocean of her childhood
rises and falls trembling
alongside the defeated women?
VIII
She burned her fields before leaving
she burned the highest tower
of your city
because she doesn’t believe in those white voices
in your books
nor in that cock perched high above who thinks he alone
can make a new dawn rise.
She does not believe in that peace which pushes her
into the winepress of your silence
nor in your parties at the expense
of those sleeping outdoors:
“I’ll give you my hairdresser’s address
and my best recipe for crab”
Marzipan peace
and dancing
dancing into a trance
in the arms of new marabout-healers
who exorcise you
take your body back and start again
according to the whims of wealth
and wit.
Peace, peace be with their bodies preserved by
the modern amulets of bank accounts.
Peace be with those women who know
the words to say
and the words to be silenced at a banquet
where all is said about
the road to take.
Peace of petits fours and mint tea
with just the right amount of make-up
around the eyes
to hide her wrinkles.
You will never undermine the storm
that swells her chest towards public places
where the wind slams your head
and makes your nose bleed on the walls.
She has burned the highest tower of your city
where your chatter comes into leaf
shamelessly
along the walls.
She burned your cities before leaving
she has only one word left to say
after a thousand and one nights to
save her own skin,
only one word
after a thousand and one nights of pure loss.
IX
I is the word, the only one to be pronounced
I say I
and I look like myself
but the I is innumerable
in the fever of my chest
in the catastrophe of my chest.
I is innumerable in the glass garden
where hangs, with its sorrowful branches
a whole forest of trees
towards the pool where they wither,
poor slaves with jeweled names.
Beneath the vicious eyes of a eunuch army
have I returned to this racket of raptors?
Is this the long-ago garden
the same owl hooting my death ?
or have I reappeared in the same nightmare
beneath a layer of mould?
Did I ever leave this garden
with locked doors?
Was I really able, one day, to escape the vigilance
of the Grand Vizier, head of the eunuchs
and headsman in his off moments ?
Am I this woman prisoner of Shahrayar ?
Am I this woman who braids her tresses
braids her grudges
and the path from which no one returns?
Is it mine, this voice lighter than a feather
but still splinter
still a riot
in Shahrayar’s harem
Have I retraced my steps back to this crystal palace
where I am alone with you, O my long hair
the only cry?
Where am I?
Who am I?
One day can we ask ourselves different
questions?
XII
I say I
and my hatred bursts in this glass garden.
Here, transparency is not for seeing
more clearly
is not for seeing farther.
Here, clarity is used to further dazzle
the penetrating gaze you thought you had,
is used to make us visible
to the third eye of Shahrayar
your master…
Useless to dig into the walls
you are visible, do you understand?
Visible
and in any case, dead.
Useless to flee
you men who care so little for your lives
all these eyes lined up on your foreheads
strongly resemble bullet-holes.
XXIII
Where I walk I see doors
and it’s not clear
and it’s not simple.
Where I walk I see women
and the women twist themselves
along branches.
A wall to the left, a wall to the right
and moss everywhere, to make it even darker.
Will I see the fountain where the water becomes ebony
becomes boat, becomes oar
and hurls itself?
Will I see the fountain which becomes feather
becomes eagle
becomes space?
Will I see mounted men
gallop toward the mountain-top
from where water gushes
into the water which permits sight
where I see an island
where I walk
where all the men and all the women
together
row towards the stars?
XXV
I say I
and innumerable arms rush
to seize my fragile neck
I
become the puppy that they drown.
But it is not written that I will be the only one
to die
nor that I will die before you.
It is not written that I will die
without having armed myself.
You are the master
our master as long as you hold
the key to the little doors
for publishing a book…
But it is not written that I will die
without having armed myself:
We are linked
by our blood
always spilled
by whatever can link us
in Shahrayar’s fortress?
I need only say I
and my hatred will burst in the glass
garden,
and a staircase will draw me towards a secret
door, out of the royal bedroom.
A door forbidden among all doors
where winged horses await
the grand departure.
I will leave, all the better to return
to the city of glass.
You are the master
but what becomes of a master
when the slaves rebel?
