Gaston Miron 1928–1996
sainte-agathe-des-monts, quebec, canada
M
iron was a leading contemporary Quebecois poet and a militant
for the cause of independence. For forty years he avidly defended
Francophone rights and participated in the Mouvement de libéra-tion populaire, the Parti socialiste québécois, the Mouvement pour l’uni-
linguisme français au Québec, and the Front du Québec français. Miron was also
an editor and helped found the publishing house Éditions de l’Hexagone and the
journals Liberté and Parti pris in the 1960s. His L’Homme rapaillé (1970) contains
all of his poetic works.
The Walk toward Love
Your eyes are the grey of fields of dew
of adventure and light years
the sweetness back of the breezes in May
...
you will come all sunstruck with existing
your mouth invaded by the coolness of grass
your body ripened by the forgotten gardens
where your breasts work their magic spells
you arise, you are dawn in my arms
where you change like the seasons
walking in a country of breath I’ll take you
at the end of miseries at the end of excesses
I want to make you love life our life
...
then the years will take me upside down
I go o√ disheveled at my wit’s end
voices murmur the tales of your realm
I speak to myself as an aside
what shall I become in my shattered strength
my dark strength of my mountains’ end
to see you forever I transport my gaze
I keep listening to sirens
in the long narrow night of the Saint Jacques tower