plunged there
are the hands which decipher the body
a pale incest
words that caused the lips that uttered them
to return to their source

tattoos of blue phrases
welts of words sculpted by old stonings

from the night river to the flowing dawn
a wild woman of the inner god
I spell out the dream from top to bottom
the alphabet branches out like coral in our eyes

rolls the water like bitter life on the eternity of the stone

this gentle but terrible specter
haunting
our mental back rooms
an invisible brightness
which brightens things to the bone
dazzles

until nightfall I have refused to write
the weight of my heart's images

and in the glance the talon of words
heavy words
that become marbled

and in the brain the blade
honed to a sharp edge

and thus the balance
is precarious
and the question deferred
to the farthest edge of twilight
near liquescent rims
but I remain constant
to my certitude
which I squeeze till it bleeds

from my shore
the journey becomes incrusted in itself
so torrid that one's gaze melts there
that the heart is violated there
yet clings to it
consents to it

Translated from the French
by Eric Sellin