In Famagusta he dreamed of a piano in the Alps.
Fetal in the shivering heights he contemplated
Templars and Janissaries, riding saddle-less
on the boiling sea.
To step forward,
to launch towards,
to run headlong even,
but stalled with lack of resolution,
lack, perhaps, of courage,
standing dumb as a nosebleed.
***
Remembering a bird among its fellows,
slut-gay among shy roses.
Chirping what tales, what lies?
Of northern lights,
of rain freezing on full-flight wings,
borne down down down over the Baltic’s
immeasurable black pity.
***
Chez nous the chenu?
White with years, or snow, or sea-foam.
Boneless apparition caged in the boneless window,
snarl drowned by coughing geese [illegible]
rising to [illegible illegible] the rose blown out of reach.
Enthusiasm or vindictiveness or both,
sweetening the common aim from countdown
to a shower of petrol.
A bouquet of orange flames,
foreshortened in a hospital vase.
White, green, and red,
evading division and baldly dioptrical.
***
July 12, 1874
Vitalie R, accompanied by her mother, wrote to her younger sister Isabelle, from London:
My dear little sister, you are so much nicer than I am. Your heart could teach mine a beneficial lesson or two. You tell us how hot it is in Charleville, but here it is, if possible, even hotter! It’s been a long time since we’ve encountered such a heat wave and yet the sky is always gray, the sun shines only faintly and there is a constant haze in the air. The boat finally docked in England and we were allowed to disembark after three and a half hours, which felt closer to eight. All the women aboard had been made ill by the crossing. Arthur was so happy and relieved to see us, as you can well imagine. I was astonished at there being so many vehicles and people everywhere one looks: London is nothing at all like our French cities. [unfortunately, the editor chooses to reduce what she has to say to the bracketed cover-all of ‘evocation of London’s sites and monuments] Yesterday, A took us on a tour of the British Museum. They keep there an infinity of treasures which it would take many months to properly explore. What can I tell you of the fish, the reptiles, the precious stones and diamonds which are there, and all of them open to the public? I saw antiquities from Egypt and China, the busts of Greek and Roman emperors, and fossils and skeletons of antediluvian creatures, such as mastodons and rhinoceroses. To be honest I don’t really understand how these things have come to preserved for such a long time. There is also a library attached to the museum, where A has gone many times, with a collection of over three million volumes. Women are allowed to use the reading rooms and to borrow books the same as men. In the evening we went for a walk along the Tamise [Thames]. Everywhere one goes there are crowds of people. We have not met a single person who speaks French, but A has seen to it that all is pleasant and cheerful and has managed everything for us.
***
A kiss, a twice-told tale,
different in perception
if similar in depth of feeling.
Frumped with the peacockery
of the self-made man,
laughed at behind his back
but suborned to every board
and panel in the district.
Tone deaf in the hushed salon
but knowing the chalk cliffs
for the fakes they were.
***
The phrase was simple and signified weakness.
Contemplation, as a means of staring it down,
seemed to offer no relief.
A magician wrecked on an island,
assembling the old spells into a liturgy.
Aches which began in the joints,
in the wrists, elbows, and knees,
and ending as a tic of the eye.
Malaria, some lingering damage to the tear ducts.
Week after week in which there was no choice
but to exist as part of the crowd.
It was immodest to suppose there would be
no more lessons.
To read events and tragedies
in the casual movement of hands,
the strains of exotic music
the others refused to acknowledge.
Barbarous skies, dreamed of since childhood,
now crowding out the real sky,
suffocating the tallest buildings,
the spires, the rooftop gardens.
***
Housed in an artery of the gigantic womb
of Hampton Court, nineteen kilometers SSW of London,
the right bank of the Thames.
Tapestries from Arras and Flanders
and a flurry of ghosts quarrelling
with the language of resurrection,
frightening clumps of tourists
in a desperate attempt to be understood.
English ghosts ever on about revenge,
while the French bore their disease mutely.
Why not linger over a friend’s death notice,
folding the column back into a breast pocket
in reserve for an after-dinner read,
letting the ghost roam for its few hours.
Selfish days.
One could not see it at the time.
Like lodging a complaint against the sun.