For this issue of ellipse, I’ve translated ten poems from “Shadowland,” the first section of Louise Dupré’s 1993 collection of lyric poetry Noir déjà.

In the opening lines of Noir déjà, note the blend of abstract thought and concrete images, of music and meaning:

L’aube comme à l’horizon / ses figures froissées / le poids de quelque jeûne

In English:

Dawn as at the horizon / its crumpled figures / the weight of some fast

Hovering at the horizon / dawn’s rumpled shapes / heaviness of some fast

In modern English, we have one noun, dawn, whereas French has two: aube and aurore. English once used alb to refer to dawn’s first milky light. Today we still use the verb dawn. There is no auber in French.

Noir déjà speaks to awakening. It describes abstract events: the world’s dawning, the arising of love and pain and beauty. In Louise Dupré’s poetry, consciousness unfolds in precise images, in rhythmic passages.

An infinitive appears in line seven: durer. Is it a question of duration or of lasting? Is it better to appeal to the Latin roots that French and English have in common and write duration? Or does one lean into the Germanic roots of Old English, where, to fast not only rhymes with to last but also carries the signification further.

Next lines:

ou la fraîcheur / à ses premiers désordres / voici l’aube / puisqu’il s’agit de durer

In English:

or the freshness / of its first upheavals / behold dawn / because it’s a matter of lasting

or the coolness / of its incipient commotions / day dawning / since it’s about enduring

Translators work in the service of various masters: not only the original text and their translated text but also in the service of their own integrity. We grope with inner tongues, ears, eyes, skin and noses to patiently attempt to give voice to a voice we love, a voice that is not our own.

It helps when the author we’re translating wishes to be complicit in the process. Louise Dupré’s work has been translated into Catalan, Korean and Chinese, among others. When the target language is indecipherable, it feels to Dupré as if she’s losing her voice. And yet the whole effort is to multiply her voice.

She and I worked closely together on the translation of Chambres/Rooms. Then and now, this complicity is a precious resource for a translator trying to transmit both tangibles and intangibles. The poems in Noir déjà exude affect, frailty and beauty. They describe perceptions, the passage of time and memory. They grieve and they love.

Translating poetry is an exercise in deep attention, a close reading. It is an attempt to make perceptible what usually passes unperceived, i.e., unseen.

Like a poet, a translator heeds the minute rustling of sounds and silences, the abstract thoughts as well as the concrete images.

A translator doesn’t just reproduce a text; they try to recreate the intangibles that make reading worthwhile.

Dawn skimming the horizon
its dishevelled shapes
the weight of some fast
or the freshness
at its first upheavals
day dawns
since it’s about enduring
another world
another mouth
its cup-chiseled contours
humid
say yet without begging
stay a little longer

_________________

Never comes to us the image
of a skull
never the bones
when our fingers crack
the rooms enclosed
upon their ruined remains
sweat, incense
odours that engulf
our eyes turn away
yet the window, the sky
unmoving
in its banality

blackboard dark already
you scraped at it, laughing

_________________

A few drops of blood
among the yellowed flowers
about to reach us
the walls closing in
our eyes mouthing
open to pretty gestures
my hips breaking apart
at the angles of your face
the dull light
still too dull
early morning

were it enough to name
the slow curve
of a moan

_________________

Patiently, you see
our hands become stained
ochre pigments that encrust
their uproars in our skin
shadow land
burnt Sienna
and the body topples
to the far side of seasons
we think of paths trampled
horses and horse shoes
we think
tranquility
the courtesies of cemeteries

_________________

Raucous
raucous and music our voices
as the dawn
unpredictability of pain
the fingers one closes
upon distraught rings
the distraught words
as you bend
toward me
emotion, tenderness
and your mouth
a taste of bitterness beneath your tongue

our voices
one more war
a burning

_________________

Close to us a shattering
of stones
torn from slumber
dawn is an abstraction
we imagine
despite the truth
beneath the still warm
eyes of corpses
the light, you say
is mistaken
if it burrows through eyelids

without our names, the day’s
instantly wasted

_________________

Outside the window
the bony slowness of silhouettes
backlit
nothing exists
less than immobility
green light or concrete
colours tremble
at the least shudder
we behold a city
blind beneath the lights
and your lip
that doesn’t last

we don’t know
where lie buried
the original walls

_________________

Rumour is a weapon
we’re defenceless against
the days just won’t end
you watch them being swallowed
minuscule notches
at street corners
it’s in profile
that faces
confront aging

all this heaviness
this blood-tinged
expectation

_________________

Is silence the name for
these interludes
where certainty ends
we dream
voices, journeys, pink places
beneath the peeling light
our words
twisting in the abyss
what matters the distance
between monuments
our lidless eyes
survey the sky
of ravaged forms

and evening awaits freshness
dawn cast
upon the torn away world

_________________

This soft horror
that clings to junctures
nothing but our heresies
before the void of temples
to calm death
when wreaths march
laid out in glory
as many mallows as carnations
while our hands inscribe
impenitent signs upon marble

negate hell
if there is a garden

L’aube comme à l’horizon
ses figures froissées
le poids de quelque jeûne
ou la fraîcheur
à ses premiers désordres
voici l’aube
puisqu’il s’agit de durer
un autre monde
une autre bouche
taillée à même la tasse
humide
on dit sans implorer pourtant
reste encore un peu

_________________

Jamais ne nous vient l’image
d’un crâne
jamais les os
quand les doigts craquent
les chambres fermées
sur leurs restes détruits
sueur et encens
les odeurs qui avalent
on tourne les yeux
mais la fenêtre, le ciel
immobile
dans sa banalité

le tableau noir déjà
tu l’écaillais en riant

_________________

Quelques gouttes de sang
parmi les fleurs jaunies
à nous atteindre
les murs se resserrent
dire nos regards
offerts aux beaux gestes
mes hanches qui se brisent
au carré de ton visage
la lumière fade
trop fade encore
le petit jour

s’il suffit de nommer
la courbe lente
d’un gémissement

_________________

Patiemment, vois-tu
nos mains se tachent
poussière d’ocre qui incruste
ses vacarmes dans la peau
terre d’ombre
terre de Sienne
et le corps bascule
de l’autre côté des saisons
on pense à des sols martelés
tant et tant de sabots
on pense
la tranquillité
le vouvoiement des cimetières

_________________

Rauques
rauques et musique nos voix
quand l’aube
l’imprévisible de la douleur
les doigts qu’on referme
sur des anneaux distraits
distraitement les mots
alors que tu te penches
vers moi
l’émotion, la tendresse
et ta bouche
un goût de soufre sous la langue

nos voix
une autre guerre
une brûlure

_________________

Près de nous éclatent
les pierres
arrachées au sommeil
l’aube est une abstraction
qu’on imagine
contre les vérités
sous les yeux
encore tièdes des cadavres
la lumière, dis-tu
a tort
si elle creuse les paupières

le jour sans nos noms
dilapidé dans l’instant

_________________

Par la fenêtre
la lenteur osseuse des silhouettes
à contre-jour
rien n’existe
moins que l’immobilité
lumière verte ou de béton
au moindre tremblement
les couleurs vacillent
on aperçoit une ville
aveuglée sous les lampes
et ta lèvre
qui ne dure pas

on ignore
où sont enfouies
les premières murailles

_________________

La rumeur est une arme
contre laquelle on ne peut rien
les jours n’en finissent plus
or les voir s’engloutir
minuscules échancrures
au détour des rues
c’est de profil
que les visages
affrontent le vieillissement

tout ce poids
cette attente colorée
de sang

_________________

Peut-on appeler silences
ces intervalles
où s’achèvent les certitudes
on rêve
voix, voyages, places roses
sous la lumière pelée
nos paroles
tournoyant dans l’abîme
qu’importe la distance
entre les monuments
nos yeux sans paupières
quadrillent le ciel
de formes dévastées

et le soir attend la fraîcheur
l’aube jetée
sur l’arrachement du monde

_________________

Cette horreur molle
qui s’accroche aux jointures
rien sauf nos hérésies
devant la vacuité des temples
calmer la mort
quand défilent les couronnes
sur lit de gloire
autant de mauves que d’œillets
nos mains gravant les marbres
de signes impénitents

nier l’enfer
s’il est un jardin