6

And the man who had beaten her till he was tired said: My angel—

7

And the man who had said: I love you, led her out and looked up into the air with a smile and praised the weather and gave her his hand.

8

Then since she was outside in the air and it grew desolate in the hut he shut the gate and sat himself down behind the newspaper.

9

I haven’t seen her since and all that remained of her was the little shout she gave when she came back to
the gate in the morning and it was already shut.

10

Now the hut has rotted and my breast is stuffed with newspaper and in the evenings I lie by the river in the dark heart of the bushes and remember.

11

The wind has a grassy smell in its hair and the water cries unceasingly to God for peace and I have a bitter taste on my tongue.

12TH PSALM

1

I have eaten grass, yes I have, and taken my friend Orge at his word, I swear, I have stolen, I don’t deny it. But I did not take her body, I couldn’t.

2

I’m not a black, I don’t say that out of modesty, but I diligently carry out my duties. But our bodies lay together between the sheets and I bit her in the throat and fell asleep.

3

Because in her blood she had dark auto-da-fés, lanterns and nigger dances and the weariness of many highways: but I was a little idiot.

4

Fat animals crept through the brown boles of the jungle around us, blue rain thundered in the plane-tree roofs and we lay like gentle plants.

5

That was Heh, the dark-skinned, she died like a cloud that has almost never been.

REMEMBERING MARIE A.

1

On that day in the blue month of September

Quietly under a young plum tree

I held her like a sweet dream in my arms

My pale love, and she was quiet with me.

And above us in the fair heavens of summer

There was a cloud, some while I saw it there

It was very white and high, so high, above

And when I looked again it was there no more.

2

Since that day many many moons have gone

Swimming quietly down, down and away

No doubt the plum trees have been felled by now

And if you ask, And what about love? I say

In answer I cannot now remember

But I do know what you mean, of course I do

But her face, in truth, I wouldn’t know it now

I kissed it once upon a time, that’s all I know.

3

And even the kiss I’d have long since forgotten

Had it not been that the cloud was also there

The cloud I do remember and always will

It was very white and high when it came over.

Who knows, perhaps the plum trees do still blossom