Антология женской поэзии

I know not why this recollection forces the frequently closed door of my memory.
It was night-time, in a Japanese tea-house.
In a subdued ascension, the monotonous rhythm, the almost eternal rhythm of three cords were struck with regularity. Three notes, no more… A rhythm in the night…

But the moon was so large, so magnificently powerful, that prodigious stalks of bamboo were seen rising beyond a pool, – which, beneath the moon, took on all the mystery of the sacred pools in the enclosure of a temple. And the immense moon gave to these prodigious stalks the appearance of a dream.

For some time, a melancholy old woman, who was beautiful and a professional musician, played tirelessly… I cannot render this feeling of eternity, of the Eternity which, formerly, seemed terrible to me, incomprehensible and deadly… This strange intuition glided in my veins, with the rhythm of three notes repeated indefinitely, with the Japanese night, with the visage of the melancholy old musician… And little by little, … and little by little, my soul was appeased until there was a divine annihilation of death in the night…

THE WRATH OF THE SWAN

One day – the small island was green and peaceful, – I went walking at random, lost in admiration of the trees and the water. Very inoffensively, – on my faith in the face of the sky! – I went walking…

And, as I contemplated the water, – I, who love and adore it! – I saw emerge from a mass of reeds, a black swan, menacing…

He swung his overly long neck to and fro, with sinuous and nearly serpentine movements…

I recalled the power of those great wings which, the easiest thing in the world, can shatter your arms…

And his red beak hissed…

Very prudently, – and vulgarly, alas! – I beat a retreat…

But oh, black swan! in all your formidability, how much I love you in your indomitable beauty!

You defended your nest, which you had a perfectly good reason to… as I, who muse in silence… as I defend with relentlessness my dreams…

Prose Poems from FROM GREEN TO VIOLET:

THE SHOP OF IDEAS

IIn an old quarter of the city, I discovered a strange little boutique where no shop window and no signboard attracted attention, and in which no one haggled, nor watched those strolling by.

I entered. A man, of whom I could see nothing but a silhouette, so impenetrable was the shadow around us, appeared without a sound.

“What, in fact, do you sell here?”, I demanded of him in the thoughtlessness of my surprise.

“Ideas”, he replied to me, in a very simple tone.

He grasped a small box and, began to rummage around in the dust:

“Would you be a utopian, by chance? Pardon the indiscretion. Do you want ideas of peace and of universal happiness? They are not dear and I have many for sale at the moment. Take them, and you may have the whole lot for 2 fr.50.”

And, before my gesture of refusal:

“Ah! you have sense: I do not guarantee their solidity. Now, here is a financial idea, but it is extremely rare and costly. I could not surrender it to you for less than three thousand francs.”

“Devil! did I, three thousand francs, that’s…”

He calmly interrupted me.

“An idea less new than this one has made the fortune of a founder of American trusts. I have not profited personally, because being too rich would bore me. I would lose my friends and the respect of the quarter.”

Something like a reflection of gold shone between his fingers.

“Now if, like me, you despise opulence, or if, which is more probable, this idea seems too high priced for you, here is, at a very good value, the dream of a poet. Three sous, this is reasonable, don’t you find?”

And he showed me a glimmer of rainbow imprisoned in a box of colours.

“Finally, as you appear to me to belong to the serious clientele, I propose to you (your countenance is creased with a grimace which should have been a smile) the magnificent idea of a libertine, all but made new, you know, and of an exceptional refinement. I would let you have it for a thousand francs. It is worth more, but this is so that you will return often to buy others from me. I truly have a collection without equal.”

“Yes”, I said, “but some of your merchandise seems to me to be well used.”

“Ah!”, he replied with pride, “these, like antique furniture, are justly the most appreciated by my clientele. But do you see nothing that can satisfy you?”

“I desire an idea that you can never sell me: an idea of my own.”

FISHHOOKS

A Scotsman, a friend from my childhood, showed me, one day, his collection of fishhooks.

“Look”, he said to me, “this is a veritable museum. They are objets d’art, these fishhooks that you see. To entice the salmon which feed on flies in their iridescent flight, we invent light fishhooks, of gold, green, blue, and violet. Some of these are fashioned with pheasant feathers: and you know that the pheasant has all the magnificence of the peacock, augmented by the inexpressible grace of being wild. These fishhooks require patient workmanship and skillful ingenuity.”

I regarded these strange jewels of torture and death. They were very beautiful in effect, brilliant like glory, glittering like love.

“And”, continued my interlocutor, “the salmon who believe themselves to be seizing the rainbow and opal wings of wandering flies, feel their throat lacerated implacably by the steel hook. It is beautiful in its struggles, it is prey to the Enemy.”

As I leaned over the jewels of torture and death:

“What do you think of my collection?”, my friend the Scotsman asked me.

“- I think”, I said to him, “that the Bible (which I have heard you squander in such copious quotations) has not lied, and that truly God has created man in his own image.”