The poem has come to speak to you
of things that are not yet there.
Escapade (51)
. . .come get a kiss from me,
I have plenty, put cool water in my mouth,
lodge the obscure in me, the heights,
and in your abundance ground
the unstable air, come to me, be devoured,
and assuage my
hideous, hideous, hideousness. . .
Escapade (54)
Nazareth, Pontacole, great disorders, punishment
Pruning shears where the sun shines, butterfly dried like a
fruit on exhibit, warmth, veranda, your cheeks are all red, school-
yards, an empty square on every floor.
You knock at my door on a rocking horse.
Escapade (55)
Take off your gardening gloves and come between my thighs.
They harbor more than one fold. A second.
The light. Our Eden is a meadow: still, like the calves.
Chante-Merle is jealous
of my long musculature.
Escapade (56)
Wind shifted from shoulder to shoulder
like a heavy backpack,
earth in flight in one corner of the rear-view mirror,
here I am, back in place.
The broken white of millstones. Your cry routs the phantoms.
I wear your clothes. Naked without my bracelet. And always come
to see you in the same dress and my mane like almond milk.
Escapade (57)
You make animals flee. You panic them with your voice.
It waits for me, mischievous: it waits for me despite the world.
A cut on the foot prevents me from fleeing
faster than the bullet you've made your target. Big
as a hairpin. Although. . .
A stride's distance between two bodies.
Escapade (58)
We call for the grand telescopes to see Venus
in front of the sun. A large pair of glasses
and aluminum foil.
What are we supposed to see? The shepherd's star. A day lasting
months. There the sky. There the books. The faces, a black room.
Escapade (59)
As a beast, I'm afraid of me.
Even in thought. A rubber band holds back my shirt and all sounds.
___________________
The Escapades
Marie-Noelle Agniau
World Poetry, 2024
translated by Jesse Hover Amar
