The wind is long

the wind runs

the wind screams

The wind screams, not the bull

the world turns, not the bull

the rain falls, not the bull

the rain is red, not the bull

you put on your hat, not the bull

you slide on your gloves, not the bull

red rain, grey grass

those hands slipping along the rainbow

those rooks those strawberries those damsels,

not the bull

the leather pouch, not the bull

the bull is a bag

the heron flies, not the bull

your day of the month, not the bull’s

the drool of girls, not the bull’s

I am another, not a bull

a breath, not a bull

that snow along our fingers, not a bull

I

pour writings into a horn

not the bull

in the shade, not the bull

the bull is black, he is white

the bull is a tailcoat

evening falls, not the bull

love reels, not the bull

you stroke your skin, not the bull

you drown your eyes

you burrow in your cunt, not the bull

the wind screams, not the bull

the wind’s ablaze

the bull is a chuckle an angel a gold trestle

love reels, not the bull

love sails up death’s alleyways,

not the bull

love dies, not the bull

it springs from the bull

love moos, not the bull

the bull is a birdsong

the heron flies the hand passes,

not the bull

that sings wings ripped

that sings with intestines showing

the bull weighs a hundred years of rope

not the rope,

the rope weighs the hanging, not the bull

the wings, not the bull

ripped, the bull

the bull is a leg

the bull is sapwood under the bark of the bull

you are you, not the bull

you are here, not the bull

the dogs are dancing, not the bull

the dwarves are dancing on the dogs, not the bull

I crack the window, not the bull

the wind is long the wind runs

the night barks at the sky, not the bull

the bull is the day planted into the heart of the day

 

translated from French by E.C. Belli

 

translated from French by E.C. Belli

O the dappled skies of love

but beware in the stairway

there are dogs wolves pipe organs

and a giraffe on each landing

Beware the chairs

chairs are shooting stars

and beware the box tree in the yard,

the deaf cry of the box tree

and beware the bed where

the deaf cry of the box tree goes to hide

Beware the elephants, they’re all trunk

and beware the schoolgirls

who hide things in drawers

Beware of attics

of their heat

of the straw covering the fire of scorned girls,

mattresses mannequins and prophecies

beware of attics

Beware of mirrors beware the pink waters

of living rooms and lakes that hide slaughterhouses

beware of bathtubs

of plastic whales and iguanodons

beware remorse deep inside the sink

beware the candied orange swimming pools

overlain with she-foxes

Beware the kitchens where pharaohs go

beware of the garden shed and the strawberry furnace

of closets, wardrobes, and beware the wash

Specifically, beware the yellow wash of summer

in the dark night of wardrobes

Beware of monsoons and monkeys

beware the curtains

the barnyards in rain

fat limp turkeys that carry disaster

Beware especially of rabbit hutches,

rabbit hutches and pedestal tables

Beware of paintings, especially still lifes

especially portraits especially landscapes,

beware bison that carry limp turkeys

that carry disaster

Beware of lamps of silhouettes of hallways,

boys and scarabs speak there in cursed tongues

and sometimes sacred tongues

that make all things blush

Beware things that blush

and cassis at the bottom of glasses

Beware libraries, stolen books without jackets

walking into cellars

O beware of cellars,

of leprosy and wine

of turbulent cellar winds

Beware of greenhouses, eagles grow there flowers fly

beware of  livestock

heifers were spotted in the father’s room

Beware of dressers

and the heads of chickadees

and beware the well in the grass

Beware of roof tiles

at night the tiles fly off in search of day

Beware of sponges pitchers of milk and replicas

beware of the VCR and avoid using the telephone

beware of armor and taxidermied creatures

and taxidermied women

and beware of drafts

Beware of barns and the fatalist men hanging there

be very afraid of grooms, and therefore beware of stables

beware pianos and their prehensile tails

beware of couches of lions of turtles

and of the Galapagos,

it’s another climate

Beware especially of planispheres, of compact powder

and of novels left open on that page with the chaise lounge,

beware that shawl (it’s no coincidence)

Beware the elevator,

there usually isn’t one

Beware knives forks and desserts

don’t get a second dessert

beware the eyeglasses forgotten on the dune

and if there is no dune beware the sea

Beware of fear

beware the parking lot, that’s where they’ll be waiting for you

beware of morning,

of evening of ink and springtime

And beware the dappled skies

 

translated from French by E.C. Belli

The night is mad, gently so

The night gently kills the madmen

She ties their long hair to the ropes of fate

And pulls

She ties their naked horses together

And pushes hard

The night takes back the madmen and their white forced laughter at reason

Small eagles small drums

The night makes the small eagles mad too

A bald child is hatching a bald chicken

The night is mad with its elbows

Placed on the table of the day

With its wolves in a hurry to come back tomorrow

No one waits for love with their breasts in the clouds like that

No one waits for him to come

Run a red light run on empty

No one the lamp no one the temples on either side of the face

No one lingering so short of breath

The night runs herself through the cold alleys

She is pink and blind

The night drops flesh into the sharks’ jaws

She serves us death, the night is mad

The night is a shark in a bed of irises

An excessive image that does not say quite enough

How the night is without you, how no one waits

For me to find the daylight again

translated from French by E.C. Belli

 

A young mountain

Let’s take her when she comes out of the water,

naked

in her fern boots

Let’s take her before the sun does, before memory does,

before that first winter,

let’s take her at the same time the wolves do

let’s take her with red lips

There’s a bridge

She doesn’t see it, she doesn’t see bridges,

she is from long before bridges

from before phantoms

Stones roll inside her eyes,

stones and clouds

and the head of the storm

Let’s take her when it’s still easy enough

and when her flank is warm,

barely conscious ourselves

of our atrocious perspiring

and of the weasels’ laugh

Let’s take the young mountain,

peek after peek, gorge until engorged

Before the bridge, before

the white ruins of love

translated from French by E.C. Belli