The poet’s work
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To
Guillevic I The fine manners of being with others On the grass bare in summer Under white clouds The fine manners of being with women In a dull warm house Under a transparent sheet The fine manners of being with oneself Before the white leaf Under the menace of impotence Between two ages and two spaces Between the boredom and the mania of living II What did you come to take In the familiar room A book none ever opens What did you come to say To the indiscreet woman What none can repeat What did you come to see In this place open to view What is seen by the blind III The way is short One arrives quickly At the colorful stones Then At empty stone One arrives quickly At equal words At weightless words Then At uncontinued words IV One year one day faroff A stroll the heart beating The landscape prolonged Our words and our motions The path went off from us The trees increased our height And we calmed the rocks Then it was that we were Setting all warmth All useful light Then it was we sang The world was intimate Then it was we were in love A crowd went before us A crowd came behind us We traveled up and down singing As ever when time No longer counts nor men And how the heart repents And how the heart is free V Even longer ago than that I was alone And trembled with it O simple solitude O denier of happy chance I avow to have known you I avow to have been abandoned And I avow even To have abandoned those I loved In the course of the years all is ordered Like an ensemble of glimmers On a river of light Like the sails of vessels In good protective weather Like the flames in a fire To establish warmth In the course of the years I have found you again O indefinite presence Volume space of love Multiplied VI I am the twin of beings I love Their double in nature the best proof Of their truth I save the face Of those I have chosen to justify me They are quite numerous they are innumerable They go through the streets for them and for me They bear my name I bear theirs We are the kindred fruit of one tree Taller than nature and all the proofs VII I know because I say it That my desires are right I would not that we pass Unto mire I would that the sun act Upon my sorrows that it quicken us Dizzyingly I would that our hands and our eyes Return from the horror open pure I know because I say it That my anger is right The sky has been trampled the flesh of man Has been cut to pieces Frozen subjugated scattered I would that it is rendered justice A justice without pity And that the executioners are struck full in the face The rootless masters amongst us I know because I say it That my despair is wrong There are everywhere tender bellies To invent men Like unto me My pride isn’t wrong The old world cannot touch me I’m free I’m not a king’s son I’m a man Erect whom some have wished to abase |
Paul Eluard