How Quietly Memories Form Mortals’ Private Underworlds! / Avec quelle discrétion les souvenirs forment les enfers privés des mortels !

 

In this quiet beginning,
something has already been set—

a reason unaware of itself,
a trace without a trace.

And thus, with a pale green smile,

those more deeply enamored,
more thoroughly charmed,

let one another’s light
shine further still.

And memories—even as
they seem to rush downward—

do nothing else

but fathom and pursue

whatever dares
to become profound

through lives and deaths
pierced through,

and through loves—

and thus the soul persists,

searching always
for scribes

to resound her heart.

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Avec quelle discrétion les souvenirs forment les enfers privés des mortels !

Dans ce commencement discret,
quelque chose est déjà posé—

une raison qui ne se connaît pas elle-même,
une trace sans trace.

Ainsi, avec un léger sourire vert,

les êtres plus profondément épris,
plus intimement charmés,

laissent davantage rayonner
la lumière l’un de l’autre.

Et les souvenirs, même lorsqu’ils semblent
se précipiter vers le bas,

ne font en vérité

que sonder et suivre

ce qui ose devenir profond—

à travers des vies et des morts traversées,
et des amours—

ainsi l’âme persiste,

cherchant sans cesse
des scribes

pour faire résonner son cœur.

Having Caught the Light on Its Way

 

On a Sunday May morning
the wind forgot to stir,

and in that solemn stillness

a neighbor’s cockerel proclaimed
to the dew-beaded meadow

once more his blessed rite—

a daybreak mass of opening
before our eyes and lungs.

And beyond the screen

tiny aquatic unmentionables
still cried out

in dewy lines of bliss

before their diffused sun.

If We Relax That Much,” She Said, “Do We Empty Ourselves of Death?”

 

Oh, the body—that untied bond!

Sometimes eyelashes set aflame
are enough—

to make even silence edge over
into another time
within another space,

where words grow heavy
yet somehow also light,

both fixed like a barb
that has already found its mark

and then set loose
to music and to dance.

Even a murmur,
however delicate and faint,

moors him and her
to a poignant depth,

there to mount
and ride the steepest waves—

where all who drift and dwell
can no longer remain

uninspired,

bodies themselves

begin to lend
an accidental,

unknotted grace—

along with a leg

lifted and drawn

high around his back.