The Yale Anthology of Twentieth-Century French Poetry

AIMÉ CÉSAIRE

whole stream of bathing beauties in their sleds as the day goes by gold as the

bread and wine of your breasts hello hello I’d like to be on the earth’s bright

underside the tip of your breasts looks and tastes like that earth hello hello

night again the rain has gravedigger fingers the rain tripping over itself on the

roofs the rain ate the sun with chopsticks hello hello in growth of a crystal it’s

you... it’s you oh absence in the wind and serpentine bather at dawn you’ll set

the river of your eyes on the enamel of the islands slipping by and in my head

you’re the dazzling maguey tree of the tide of eagles under the banyan

—mary ann caws and patricia terry

New Year

Out of their torments men carved a flower
which they perched on the high plateaus of their faces
hunger makes a canopy for them
an image dissolves in their last tear
they drank foam rhythmed monsters
to the point of ferocious horror
In those days
there was an
unforgettable
metamorphosis
on their hooves the horses were rearing a bit of dream
fat fiery clouds filled out like mushrooms
over all the public squares
there was a terrific pestilence
on the sidewalks the smaller streetlamps were rotating their lighthouse
heads
as for the anophelic future it was hissing in the gardens a scorching vapor
In those days
the word shower
and the word topsoil
the word dawn
and the word shavings
conspired for the first time
—clayton eshleman and annette smith