Day on Fire
The door shined in fiery daylight
but the braids of the women there
held still
one of them leaned over the waters on the cauldron
and on a piece of porcelain
a painted bird had worn itself out with singing.
The messenger was seen to come in
with a letter and a golden loaf in his hands
he spoke
then it was dead silence
and the whole garden gave up its scent.
Landscape with Two Laborers
The countyside was calm
a girl was washing her unblemished leg
and the hours
etched themselves into the cloth they faded
attacking the damask flowers.
The pages of a schoolbook
had been carried off by the wind
up above the eglantines
and down the length of the path
to ditches filled with clever beasts
to embankments covered in those herbs
favored for soothing teas
two laborers took their time
telling each other
the secrets of working with wood.
The Notice
The child pushing along the ring of a barrel
as his makeshift hoop
runs alone and shouts
but to the one who has just spelled out
beneath the N and the eagle of Empire
the draft notice
the old man says simply
in the blazing sun
while drinking a foamy pear cider:
"the next century will be worse"
though lovers go by singing.
Edge of the Hearth
The outbuildings with no real use
are left to the rains
a peasant woman
has an edge of the black hearth
for a seat
the evening turns
in swirls of her breath
the wind in the hollow tree
why beings and things
she thinks
and not nothing
_______________________________
Jean Follain
Earthly
The Song Cave 2025
translated by Andrew Seguin
