Love Poem with Dark Face

J'aurais dans mes mains ton visage obscur —Yves Bonnefoy [1] what should i call this poem i’ll call it a rush of chambers a racket of foliage i’ll call it love poem with dark face pretty title someone i don’t know who tells me watch out for words with meaning don’t look for truth in beauty learn to breathe with your gaze in an art gallery a woman with sad eyes devours rats devours picassos sleeps in hospital rooms listen to this story once upon a time a princess bah death will not be long in coming death with its blue eyes on my empty plate [2] she’ll never know who i am she’s blind and hates when people look at her i offer her a bonfire a fistful of snow offer her a freshly cut rose what should we talk about now? let’s talk about the sky let’s talk about fear there’s going to be a storm tonight a person would do better to drop and never get up how’s that i ask but she disappears i don’t know if she’ll ever return still i wait with my milk tooth with my old stamp collection with my razor blade and a mirror at night she comes whispers in my ear there’s no one but you in a million years i’ll learn her real name know her dark face flush with sky flush with fear [3] why am i writing this? you incandescent pupil i’m a swan that dreams of dying in your dream inside a box where hell burns where everything is blinding the storm doesn’t say a word stays mute you should have seen me that time the vineyards were in bloom the cows were grazing i was happy you were happy the enigma’s transparence cooled our coffee the myth’s dissection the death of any and all theories i’m a swan my dream is to die in your dream why didn’t you look at me? [4] my students asked me what is the meaning of pain so i sliced a doll’s finger with a razor blade there was no blood no batting of lashes this i told them is pain [5] i read and write at the same time it’s only proper the mountains overwhelmingly approve the night shuts one eye and looks at me with the other there is nothing around but plastic flowers purgatories on the brink of closure doors and windows the light grows impatient time destroys clocks may i speak? there’s no need to the pages are on fire your lamp is burning i take off my clothes and let the cold ignite my penis [6] now i come to the hardest part of the story the part where i talk about porpoises and dolphins the woman with the sad eyes vomits rats into the toilet i speak of my desire i don’t want her to know about it i’ll just say a word brush my hand against her hair and if she runs ah the lost words the dark rooms each with its death rattle of birds all soaring skyward the woman closes her eyes go in me she says i’ve forgotten your name i don’t have a name from high above the bed a god observes us his wounded body conveying how much she wants me [7] sorrowful boy come whenever you like i’ll burn in your memory sear your tongue all kinds of confusion will find a place in your senses any expression will be allegory in our hands i have a notebook for you a glass of water some dead fish i said to her sorrowful girl i love notebooks await every night a glass of water on my tongue dead fish are a delirium my students ask what’s delirium i unbutton my shirt and show them your breasts this is delirium [8] a rush of overflowing chambers it’s playtime now you’re the shadow and i’m the light you lick my wounds while i sink into the lightning flash into both sets of darkness where you sleep and i await the word smoke is the word tomorrow your body and mine will sing and there will again be woods unfurling before my eyes open venetian blinds a fount of angels atop the dirty laundry tell me a story anything what’s important is that we awaken and not give in to sleep happy loves rot as surely as blighted ones do bye bye she says bye bye flowers in her wounded hands [9] to let the body not love drift through other bodies that’s how banishment how violent expulsion begins quite a lovely light is dying amid the debris no one can see it ice is deceptive when it shines bright the sky an irrevocable past a voice inspiring pity a voice that never reaches us [10] disturbing the marble slab’s geometry beneath her feet the sought-after metaphor is a blue cyclone the dark alley the grave of all projects though nothing stands in our way we can be happy but there’s no one here only me besides the words the untimely trips and scarlet buses i remember her light which made the pain grow dark and still she went away i followed until i lost her trace no one ever taught me to lose a desire a purple cloud envelopes my body the students ask me what is a body i draw a word in the air the word bursts and drops to the ground this i tell them is a body