‘The Thing’
I was told these things and repeat them here. Take them as you will. There is no proof offered, there can be no refutation. An earthquake hit my land and each person lived this experience differently.
Common Haitians call it “The Thing” – “Bagay la”. It is nameless, this monster, like the thousands of lives it stole in one brief moment. It is as if naming it more precisely would cause it to return. And this is the fear you hear in people’s voices when they ask: “What have you heard about ‘The Thing’? What are they saying about ‘The Thing’? Is ‘The Thing” going to come back?
“The Thing”, zigzagging haphazardly, following a trajectory known only to itself, leveling one house, missing the next, lasted an eternity. How do you mark time when the ground undulates beneath your feet? There are so many ways it is described, this ‘Thing’ that manifested itself that afternoon, leaving Haitians in such fear that even those whose houses are undamaged will not sleep inside. When I finally reached Port-au-Prince a month later to connect with friends and family, these are the stories I heard, each a piece of the quilt that forms a whole.
Ramize describes it as a dragon breathing fire- a flash of light briefly seen, rapidly extinguished. And Ramize has never even seen a dragon.
There were places the sea parted in Grand-Gôave I heard, leaving fish flapping loudly on the sand.
“The earth opened”, Magaly said, “and swallowed the house as if it were hungry”.
“I saw my house sway side to side as if it were a branch dancing in the wind and then I screamed for my daughter to come out”. Carole relives this moment every time she tells the story.
Jacqueline describes a bombing even though she has not lived through any wars. She was driving when “The Thing” hit her car, bouncing it like a ball in the street.
Elizabeth was seated at her terrace crafting a bracelet. Her chair bounced, or was it the street? “Avenue Christophe was bouncing” she says. Her black and white tiles have burn marks. From where? Where did this dragon breathing fire come from? She says : ”It is not the corpses in the street I will remember though I have never seen so many dead before, it is the silence that preceded the wailing of women”.
The building where Willy was attending a meeting collapsed . He took refuge under a portico. He survived unscathed. One of his friends did not.
Someone accompanies Gardy home. He is later found wandering aimlessly in the street, his eyes vacant. “Why are you back in the street? What happened?” “I opened my gates and I did not see my house.” His entire family had been indoors at the time.
Raymond survived the crash because he took shelter under a desk.
At a street corner, Blanc in a cloud of alcohol was in the middle of a dispute with a man whose screams of “Filthy drunk” left him unmoved. “The Thing” is what moved him, plastering him with force against a wall. “The other man was hit so hard by falling debris, Mademoiselle Michèle, he died without saying “Ah”.”
A man sound asleep on a top floor found himself noisily awakened, and thoroughly disconcerted babbled, “But I was just sleeping!”
A friend’s mother, a patrician octogenarian, was found a few days later lounging in bed protected by walls among the rubble, marking prayers on her rosary. How many Hail Mary’s and Our Father’s did she say before she heard the voices calling her name? “I am here. I am thirsty. Why make me wait so long for the glass of water I requested?” she asked with irritation.
Reggie’s office collapsed, his house was destroyed. How do you start your life over at 60?
At the ministry Marie worked, the building collapsed and she jumped in stilettos through a window. Not a scratch, not a sprained ankle. Just the trauma.
Haitians talk about the trauma of the interior and the trauma of the exterior. Depending on where you were at the time. Which is worse? Is there a Richter scale to measure fear? What is the magnitude of anguish?
Jessie says “We have had to armor ourselves against the fear, against the pain, against the dead”. The morning after the quake, she saw eighty corpses in the street where she had been the afternoon before. I started to cry when I hugged her “We have cried too much “ she said.”We have no more tears”.
Josie’s brother was hit so hard in the back of his neck, his eyes were projected out of their sockets. She saw so many wounded and dead at the hospital where she brought him, she has lost her head.
Another family’s maid was found under the rubble. Her poor body, so broken,was placed in a sheet. When it was lifted up, it formed a lump of ground meat dripping blood through the fabric’s weave.
There are things human eyes should not see, human ears should not hear. You do not witness certain things, even second hand, even a month later with impunity. After visiting the downtown area, I felt feverish and laid down sick, two days after my return home. There was little left of the Port-au-Prince I knew but rubble and broken buildings, still a few corpses in the streets, entire areas where Godzilla seems to have walked indiscriminately. Monster. “Thing”, which destroyed my city leaving the ghosts of more than two hundred thousand hidden among the smoke, the debris, the steel dust and sand.
These fleeing women stumbling out of houses, clutching children, these men caught under the rubble, their deaths are no longer their own but ours. Whether their lives and their deaths were for hope, a new beginning or for nothing, we will decide. Let the dead bury the dead. The living must change the world.
Michèle Voltaire Marcelin (02-20-2010)
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don’t worry about me…
I finally reached her today. Since Tuesday, I had been praying and pressing the redial button on the phone. Redial had not worked, so I was hoping the prayers would. Amidst the desolation and news of relatives who had died and loved ones still unaccounted for, friends had sent a few messages saying they had seen her, she was fine… but she’s 89 you know, and suffered a stroke, so I needed to hear her voice, I needed to hear the “Oh, oh, oh” she says when she means something is too much to comment on, when she has no words to speak, none suited for what is happening. I worried about her medication. Would she be able to get some and where. Pharmacies were closed. And what about water and what about this and what about that and I kept my finger on redial and had private conversations with all the gods and the saints I remembered, and today I reached her, I reached her today; today I spoke to my mother. And she said “Oh,oh,oh” and I choked.
But I knew she was fine. I knew she was fine when she told me that I should not worry about her, that even though the country was in shambles, she had everything under control. She kept on telling me about the entire country, about those who had died, about the destruction of all the landmarks we knew and lived with. She told me about everything I had already known from the endless stream of visuals about Haiti. I kept trying to interrupt “Maman, I know about this, I want to know about you!” She waved all my questions away : “Woy pitit, ou poze twòp kesyon! Nou byen.” (Child, you ask too many questions! We’re fine.) “In any case,” she added, “I don’t think you could do anything from where you are.” (A vote of non-confidence for the diaspora!) “Maman, please!” I begged for answers. She repeated again how she was fine; how she had arranged things for herself and the “lakou” (the communal yard) : “Nou solidè’ (We depend on each other.)
The earth was still shaking, so she slept in a car with a neighbor while others slept on the ground. Whatever she cooked was shared like it always had been, only now the portions were reduced to essential frugality. Water was still available and “Pitit,(child), na degaje nou (we’ll manage)”. And I asked about the house, what damage it sustained and the walls, and the street: was it obstructed? I asked about the trees that witnessed my growing up, the trees my beloved Manzèlore had planted. And my mother admonished me “Child, we do not talk about property. We have lost no lives”, and my mother and I discussed and argued over the phone as I if it had been prior to Tuesday, as if it had been a normal day, as if this had never happened and I knew my mother was fine and I also understood that in her reticence to talk about herself , in her refusal to complain , she was trying to tell me what had happened was so much bigger than her that I should not worry about her, that I should worry about my country. I understood that what she described was going on in every neighborhood. Things were going to get more difficult and their generosity would be put to the test, but meanwhile, huddled like bees in a hive, Haitians were sharing what they had with each other: the rough and sweet skin of things, space if they had it, or food, or water and definitely the prayer the country would survive, even if they did not.
Michèle Voltaire Marcelin
Memento Mori: Cousins Georges and Mireille were buried under the rubble. Ti Charles lost 2 sons, and if you know that Ti Charles is a Kenscoff peasant and his sons had become teachers at the University where they were also trapped under the rubble, you will understand his despair. Cousin Valerie and her 10 year old daughter also died under their collapsed home. And for all lives lost, we offer our prayers.
"Secrets d’une danseuse de tango…"
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La comédienne, Michèle Voltaire Marcelin sur la scène du Théâtre Gesù à Montréal dans "Secrets d’une Danseuse de Tango" de Graciela Lopez, traduit par Jean-Marie Bourjolly.Michele Voltaire Marcelin onstage at the Gesù Theater in Montréal in her adaptation of Graciela Lopez’ text "Secrets of a Tango Dancer", translated to French by Jean-Marie Bourjolly. |
"Que cosas, hermano, que tiene la vida, yo no la quería cuando la encontré;
Hasta que una noche me dijo resuelta, "Ya estoy muy cansada de todo", y se fue.
¡Que cosas, hermano, que tiene la vida! Desde aquella noche la empezé a querer!"
(Argentine Tango. 1932. Música: Rodolfo Sciammarella. Letra: Luis César Amadori)
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"Le tango. Tout le monde sait ce que c’est que le tango. Cette étreinte sensuelle; cette fête qui fait descendre les coeurs dans les jambes et monter la tête dans les nuages. Le tango. Cette conversation ponctuée par le va-et-vient de la cadence avec des pauses et des jeux de pieds rythmés qui sont autant de caresses muettes…" |
"A tango. Everyone knows what a tango is. A sensual embrace; a celebration that makes hearts drop in one’s legs and heads rise above the clouds. A tango. A conversation punctuated by the back and forth movement of the cadence with pauses and rhythmic feet movements that are like mute caresses…" |
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Mélancolie et sensualité. Au rythme du bandonéon, le tango évoque les peines de coeur et les déchirements du désir inassouvi. Fatal, orgueilleux ou brutal, le tango est une danse qui se danse à deux. Lorsque les corps s’accordent pleinement et se meuvent ensemble au rythme de la musique, elle provoque une émotion que seuls les danseurs et danseuses de tango connaissent. Les deux partenaires marchent ensemble vers une direction impromptue à chaque instant, mais dans le tango traditionnel, c’est l’homme qui guide la femme qui se laisse aller naturellement, les yeux fermés, sans chercher à deviner les pas. Reflection des attitudes culturelles conservatrices entre hommes et femmes de temps immémorial. Pourtant, la marche rythmique du tango (avoir les pieds bien sur terre) permet aussi de trouver son centre, sa balance, et de se soumettre en toute complicité a un partenaire sans renoncer à soi. |
Accompanied by the rhythm of the bandoneon, tangos evoke heartbreaks and unfulfilled desire. This dance of improvisation, in which partners attuned to each other and to the musical phrasing, walk in an embrace can awaken emotions in the dancers in ways no other dances can. In the old style of tango, the woman is dependent on the man, and in the embrace, he guides her every move. A reflection of the conservative cultural attitude between men and women, which has existed for time immemorial. But the walking of a tango allows one to feel the ground and find one’s center and balance, which leads to dancing in partnership without losing one’s own bearing. |
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"Comment peut-on vivre sans avoir envie d’enlacer et d’être enlacé ? Comment peut-on faire sans ce dialogue muet entre un homme et une femme où personne n’a le dessus, où pendant trois minutes tout est possible ?" |
More than anything else, dancing a tango is about a connection between two people, the need to embrace and be in the arms of another, to escape, albeit for just a brief moment of time, and in that moment, to live a life time. |
"Quién hubiera dicho" Tango argentin interpreté par Adriana Varela
Michele Voltaire Marcelin
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krik?krak!
I sat under the palm fronds, safely ensconced in the folds of Manzèlore’s wide skirt that smelled of ti-baume, of fey kowosol and other wild herbs; only a sliver of moon illuminated the sky. Corn crackled as it grilled on an open fire and Manzèlore, the kindest, most generous soul I have ever known, who now lives in the land of truth — I call her name without diverting her from the path of the dead – Manzèlore would say Pitit mwen (although I always knew I was her special child, she called flowers and plants, all animals and every child hers as she spoke to them gently, watering the first, caressing the others, braiding my wild hair and feeding us all) Pitit mwen, she would repeat as she removed the kernels from the corncob, shaking off the heat as she made them dance in her palm, and she would call out Krik! and eagerly, I would respond without a beat Krak! and she would tell me stories of angels with gossamer wings and of Tezin, master of the waters; of the peasant who sought to marry her only son with a princess, of the magical orange tree, of female werewolves who removed their skins at night to fly in the countryside. She would change her voice for each character and she would sing and I carry her voice inside me, I carry it in my heart as I sing lost fragments of songs that come to me randomly at night : ti pye zoranj pouse pouse (grow little orange tree) …. or manman o manman men koulèv la ape manje’m (mother o mother the snake is eating me) or ensel ensel miyon miyon, ensel badyo’m nan ( my one, my only precious child)…
So I was ecstatic when the FI:AF (French Institute Alliance Française) through Professor Etienne Télémaque, contacted me for a Krik?Krak! event during their World Nomad series celebrating Haiti. It gave me the opportunity to say Manzèlore’s name –an honor I never refuse — to engage in a Tim Tim? Bwa Chèch! Nou bwè pwa? session of Haitian riddles with the audience; to tell the love story of Tezin, to say a Frankétienne poem to Frankétienne himself — a blessing I will long remember — along with poems of Syto Cavé, James Noël and of Tiga;
to sing with Martina Bruno and Buyu Ambroise and to recreate briefly in the Skyroom Theater of the FIAF, one of the evenings I hope all those present will carry — as I do — in their hearts. Click here for photos of the event and until I see you again, I end my story the way Manzèlore would end all her stories: e yo banm youn ti kout pye ki fè’m ateri isit la….(I was gently kicked until i reached these parts)
Michèle Voltaire Marcelin
Artwork credit: Edwidge Danticat Krik? Krac! book cover
talisman
story-brecht forum
come have a drink he said. he was so much older. and good looking too. i was flattered. come have a drink. a drink was something a woman had. a woman wearing perfume, maybe femme by rochas. my mother wore that, even though my mother did not have drinks with men. not even with my father. my mother was all woman but she did not drink. come have a drink. and i envisioned a woman in an elegantly fitted dress clicking her heels across a tiled café floor, crossing her legs at the bar and slowly pulling out a cigarette, a menthol comme-il-faut. the man looking deep into her eyes lit by the flickering match. the drink was something pretty, pink or turquoise like that gin my father kept on the shelf. bombay sapphire was a name that made you dream. there would be a glass with clinking ice cubes from which she would slowly sip the colored liquid. with my imagination, i should be writing scenarios. i don’t even know where i get this from. maybe some trashy ‘nous deux‘ magazines read on the sly at the beauty parlor? fotonovelas where the women had exotic names like marina or ilse and the drama was resolved in 5 pages.
artwork:veronica-artarazzi
artwork: balthus
that saturday, i decided to wear my magic pants. i never told my friends but i had magic clothes when i was a teenager. my clothes had special powers. they could make me invisible or confident; they could make me invincible; they could make me different. i never told anyone because i was afraid they would think i was strange. or stranger. admit it, you think I am strange. you would have laughed at perseus as well. do you remember when he set out to slay medusa, wearing the winged sandals he received from the nymphs? (i had a pair of sandals that made me fly unerringly across a dance floor, so i trusted perseus’ story but you would not have; i know your kind). on perseus’ head, was the goddess athena’s gift: the helmet that made him invisible. what nonsense you would have said. and losing his resolve, he would have weakened and turned to stone under medusa’s glare. where would we be then? how would that story have ended? with people persecuted by a snake-headed irate woman no doubt and human statues everywhere. she was not nice, medusa. that’s the most i’ll say about that subject. not being partial to reptilian-coiffured females, personally, i’m glad perseus slayed her. maybe now that i have told you that story, you’ll be more inclined to believe my clothes were talismans that could protect me? hope springs eternal.
photo: schloss
my magic pants made me beautiful. they were fringed bell bottoms of the softest muted russet, the color of an overripe apricot that long laid in the sun. they were in my mind as sumptuous as a ball gown would have been to a princess. i wore them to parties, i wore them to after-school games. i wore them to church. I wore them until my friends were sick of them. i wore them until i wore them out. and that afternoon as i was getting ready, I discovered the pants’ zipper was broken. i had other clothes mind you, but none with powers as magical. i was distraught yet i decided to wear the pants anyway and sew them shut on me. now, i have to tell you i don’t sew. a needle is a deadly weapon in my fingers. i can wage war on fabric and destroy clothes. we had sewing lessons in school and while the other girls moved on to beautiful embroidery, i was still painstakingly practicing single-stitching a piece of cloth which looked like a sieve with the holes i made pulling out the crookedly stitched threads. later a stapler became my personal hand sewing machine as i repaired loose hems and torn clothes. it required no particular skill, was definitely faster than sewing and i carried one in my school bag. but stapling the pants on me was an impossible task, and desperate times calling for desperate measures, i threaded a needle and sewed my lower body shut in those pants as in a shroud.
artwork:helenederoubaix
the afternoon sun shone through the trees as i skipped on the road clad in my magical clothes, and in my wild imaginings, i could see how he would greet me, where I would sit, how he would pour me the drink, the conversation we would have and then his words of departure as he would gently hold my hand. i was giddy. do not misunderstand me, i was not in love. i was not, was not, was not. but it was saturday and i was going to have a drink with him. i lived the moment so intensely before it happened, i could actually have turned around and gone home. there was nothing he could do that would match what i had already dreamt of. as i reached his gate, punctual, and i’ve always been punctual; always there when expected, when required; the right girl at the right time at the right place, he greeted me and led me to the open patio. i glided as i thought i would on the black and white tiles. there was a wrought iron table and two chairs, a bottle of barbancourt pineapple rum liqueur and two glasses. did that mean his mother was not around? for some reason i had never thought about his mother. we spoke lightly of light matters, the weather, common friends; he was charming and made me laugh as he poured me glass after glass of the sweet alcohol. i crossed my legs on the chair awkwardly, choked on the cigarette he had offered, nervously sipping the fruit flavored rum. i was flushed, smiling and giggling with a lightheartedness that would have pleased those who thought me sullen and withdrawn. i saw everything as through a haze, the way you see the world if you’re looking at it through the fine weave of a silk scarf, everything blurry and pretty, all the imperfections gone. gently, still laughing , he led me by the hand to a room.
photograph:paul cava
a hundred years may go by and i may become blind, but I could still recreate this room from memory after having seen it in this brief drunken cloud. this was a woman’s bedroom. with the smell of a woman. it was tidy and pretty, with everything in its place. on the mirrored vanity, a huge rectangular fragrance bottle of vivara shone on an embroidered white doily facing the photograph of a fair woman, her lipsticked smile and eyes as hard as the crystal frame that contained her likeness. there was a mahogany armchair, lamps on both sides of the bed covered with quilted reddish satin and plump pillows. i swayed, dizzy from the rum liqueur. he guided me gently to the bed, he did everything so gently, and immediately I felt his weight on me. suddenly understanding why i am here, I say no stop no. my voice muffled as if coming from underwater. time distorted, everything happening faster and slower at the same time as if we are going through a tunnel at breakneck speed with headlights off or swinging with exceeding slowness on a amusement park ride, something like a freefall at coney island and i am screaming a silent scream, pushing away these hands, restraining these hands that seem to be everywhere all at once, moving them away as they cover my mouth, slide under my shirt, loosen my bra. these hands feeling my breasts, tugging at my pants, struggling to get them off. prying hands searching for the opening, the buttons, the zipper, impatient hands slipping inside my pants, frantic hands trying to rip them off me and my voice suddenly returned to me, my voice coming through the fog of alcohol screaming let me go and tears streaming down my face crying outloud i did not know i did not know this would happen and inside my head all i wanted was to glide across shiny tiles and sit on a bar stool with a man who would gently touch my hand and offer me a drink… all i wanted.
photograph:paul cava
i did not want these hands on me. touching me. snatching away at my clothes. tearing my flesh as I tore myself from him and my voice returned i am fifteen i said and my father. i said my father and suddenly he stopped and said i could never say anything to my father and there was fear in his eyes and he was suddenly pitiful, a whimpering puppy and I staggered up and hooked my bra and lowered my shirt. and my pants, oh my pants had not budged an inch, those stitches as strong as the metal fasteners from my stapler. my pants securely tight on my body, my shroud sewn tight to protect me, my talisman. my pants.
artwork:helenederoubaix
i ran out of that house, stumbling and weaving in and out of the road, walking through plants and leaves and vines. i was still crying, mumbling the prayers of a lost child let loose in the world. i could not embroider but i could single-stitch, and i wanted to thank mademoiselle edline who didn’t give up on me and persistently threaded my needle so I could make holes in that piece of cloth. so I could sew my pants on me. so I could protect me.
michele voltaire marcelin
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ars poetica
Nikaa - Ars Poetica
What to do before the suffering of others? What to do for Haiti, for Palestine, for Irak, for Darfur? What to do for girls forced into prostitution, for women battered, for rape victims, for those without the comfort of home or friends? Peruvian poet César Vallejo writes:
“A cripple walks by, giving his arm to a child.
After that, I’m going to read André Breton?
Another trembles with cold, coughs, spits blood.
Will it ever be possible to allude to the deep Self?
Another searches in mud for bones, rinds.
How to write, after that of the Infinite?
An outcast sleeps with his foot to his back.
To speak,after that to anyone of Picasso?”
As we are confronted daily with human suffering, and stories of violence and images of terror continue to exercise their power, yes, suddenly, love, art, and literature can seem beside the point. But I believe it is precisely in these moments that love and poetry become most necessary. We live in the heart of a savage world, violent and indifferent. Relentlessly, it tries to strip us of our humanity and our compassion; relentlessly we must resist to retain our tenderness. We do so with our light and our personal voice. If we are not to take the name of poetry in vain, we must turn the terrible sounds of disaster into music. This from Palestinian poet Taha Muhammad Ali:” ..Art is worthless unless it plants a measure of splendor in people’s hearts.”
Another one of the most urgent commandments of poetry is to remember, to bear witness, and to do so “with blood- as if it were your last.” as the Bulgarian poet Dimitrova compels us to do:
“Write each of your poems
as if it were your last.
In this century, saturated with strontium,
charged with terrorism,
flying with supersonic speed,
death comes with terrifying suddenness.
Send each of your words
like a last letter before execution,
a call carved on a prison wall.
You have no right to lie,
no right to play pretty little games.
You simply don’t have the time
to correct your mistakes.
Write each of your poems,
tersely, mercilessly,
with blood — as if it were your last.”
Even in the most desperate times, poets dare fight with their words and their song against weapons of war. The Hebrew poet Aharon Shabtai, who unwaveringly identifies with his Arab neighbors, has written this scathing indictment against the Israeli Government:
“I, too have declared war:
You’ll need to divert part of the force
deployed to wipe out the Arabs-
to drive them out of their homes
and expropriate the land-
and set it against me.
You’ve got tanks and planes,
and soldiers by the batallion;
you’ve got the ram’s horn in your hands
with which to rouse the masses;
you’ve got men to interrogate and torture;
you’ve got cells for detention.
I have only this heart
with which i give shelter
to an Arab child.
Aim your weapon at it;
even if you blow it apart
it will always,
always mock you.”
so, on days when all seems dark, when the world pours in and your pain blows words out of my mouth, i look at opened windows and running trains with a craving hard to explain, but i rush by quickly, eyes shut tight, and count my breaths, and when i catch a glimpse of myself, a talking shadow in full light, hair blowing and blind, i must seem, not knowing my left from my right, always lost, but as i stand here, in my age of reckoning, a woman at the end of her history, i tell you i know i have found myself, i have found happiness where i did not seek it and grief has come frequently when i did not expect it, and come to stay, like an unwelcome guest you cannot turn away, but it has marked me to allow my heart to break with tenderness and i give thanks for the voice i have been given, for the little song i can sing, for the light i can add to everyone else’s, for i have tasted it all, the bitter, the sweet and what was forbidden me, but i am alive, and have learned to live in this world which is beautifully hopeless and hopelessly beautiful, and if i am remembered at all, it will be because whatever else is true or false, and because i have craved its light, i have unflinchingly faced love and embraced it.
michele voltaire marcelin
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Ma mort
Malgré le flou tout blanc qui empêchait les sons aigus de me parvenir, j’avais pu entendre des bribes de phrases “Vraiment désolé Guy. Difficile à dire. Tout faire pour adoucir ses jours. Trois mois peut-être.” Alors j’avais compté. Mars. Avril. Mai. Guy aussi avait dû compter. Et après la phase initiale du chagrin, il avait dû faire des projets. Il fallait bien.
Et si je ne mourrai pas? Si le médecin annonçait une de ces guérisons miraculeuses? Prolongée d’une convalescence accélérée? Suivie d’un rétablissement fulgurant…Imaginez-vous sa stupeur?
Et malgré le choeur éploré qui va s’écrier “Pauvre madame Raine, mourir si jeune!” , je sais que j’ai eu ma part de vie et qu’elle me fut douce. Douce.
Maintenant, je vais dormir un peu. Je me sens fatiguée
Michèle Voltaire Marcelin
(fragments inédit Amours & Bagatelles)
Le cinéma
Trois ans que j’ai laissé ma ville. Ces années ont passé comme un vertige. Après tout un ballet de compromis, je suis partie. J’ai laissé derrière moi ceux qui vivent, à la grâce de Dieu, de soupe de terre et d’eau salée. Quel Dieu permettrait cela? J’ai laissé ceux qui sucent la gelée amère de l’aloès pour ne pas mourir tout à fait. Je suis partie. Egoïste va. Tu aurais dû rester. Je suis arrivée dans ce pays sans en parler la langue. Hola, Hola! Ils disaient tous Hola. Moi je répondais par mon nom. Je croyais qu’ils s’appellaient tous Hola. Bientôt, je vais apprivoiser ces mots étrangers. Dans la rue, on me touche la peau et les cheveux. Les noirs sont porte-bonheur. Je suis dans un lycée de filles. Elles cacquètent comme des poules. L’après-midi je vais au Granada. On y montre des films en noir et blanc. J’aime cette salle obscure où il ne semble exister que moi. Dans le silence et la solitude, j’abandonne ma peau contre celle des personnages et au mot Fin, c’est toujours le même vertige, le même étourdissement. Dans l’éclat brutal du jour, je change de démarche, de voix, de regard. Je ne suis plus cette lycéenne qui évite de regarder son reflet dans les devantures. C’est moi la fiancée du pirate. Je suis l’amoureuse transie qui s’en va sanglotant sous la pluie, même s’il n’y a pas de pluie. J’étouffe les sanglots de Marguerite sacrifiée, quand Armand s’en va pour la dernière fois. Je cherche encore cette bicyclette volée, et si j’osais, je me mettrais a courir en criant derrière le camion des soldats jusqu’à tomber par terre, les bras en croix comme fait la Magnani. C’est au Granada que je l’ai rencontré. Je marchais vite comme d’habitude pour ne pas rater la séance. Il m’a suivie, s’est rapproché et sans rien dire, s’est assis auprès de moi. Dans le silence mutuel, j’ai regardé son visage pâle troué par l’ombre de yeux trop noirs en vérité. Sa main qui suspendue un instant dans l’air se pose sur ma cuisse. Il est revenu le lendemain. Il n’a plus l’hésitation de la veille. Il remonte ma jupe, la fait bouffer en corolle sur le rouge des chaises, velours doux sous la pulpe des doigts, et m’embrasse incognito au fond du cinéma. Sur l’écran, de Sica fait valser ‘Madame de’ en répétant Je ne vous aime pas. Le temps qu’elle meure de chagrin, lui s’en ira.
Il revient chaque après-midi à l’heure du film. A chaque fois plus audacieux. J’ai vu cette semaine là, le Cuirassé Potemkine, les Nuits de Cabiria, l’Ange bleu, la Bataille d’Alger qui est depuis devenu mon film favori. J’adore le cinéma!
De toute eternité
“C’était un amour magnifique et extravagant. Vieux comme le monde. Fluide comme le temps. Lui-même en souriant disait qu’ils s’aimaient depuis deux siècles.Pour elle, n’existait que le temps d’avant lui et celui d’après. Le premier si court qu’il ne lui restait en mémoire que des souvenirs d’enfance. Le second temps rempli de cet évènement. De cet amour toutes-vices, toutes-conditions dans lequel elle s’égarait jours, nuits et mois dans la même atmosphère où s’entremêlaient tendresse et cruauté. Les années se confondant dans une prétendue eternité où s’enflammait cette passion qui dépassait le décorum auquel les autres essayaient de la réduire. Si à peine sortie de l’enfance, elle avait cherché cet homme, l’avait elle cherché ou était-il venu à elle? Si elle continuait à le rechercher avec cette impatience irrépressible, tout en maintenant des amours parallèles, c’était parce que depuis toujours, seculo seculorum, de toute eternité et par la grâce du ciel, elle savait que la moitié d’elle-même qui lui donnait des ailes, demeurait en lui.
Elle l’avait donc toujours aimé.”
michèle voltaire marcelin
fragment inédit
Amours & Bagatelles
Adieu
“On couche toujours avec les morts.”
Léo Ferré
“Je prends congé des morts, mais pas pour les oublier.”
Saramago
Parfois, j’ai des nuits empoisonnées de cauchemars…
J’erre à travers un grand jardin saccagé par le vent. Des aboiements déchirent le silence. Un chien me poursuit. Un chien noir, pelé, famélique. Il me poursuit et il gronde féroce, canines offertes. Je perds ma route et me retrouve pantelante, affolée, devant une grille rouillée que j’essaie vainement de pousser. Une odeur d’angoisse, aigre, phosphorescente, m’envahit… Je suis trempée d’urine et de sueur…
Par la porte entrouverte de la chambre, je vois Nestor venir à moi. Il revient fréquemment la nuit, en grand mystère, dissiper mes mauvais rêves et hanter ma pensée. Un parfum de miel et d’alcool le précède; un souffle grisant, presque écœurant, de figues trop mûres. Une nuée de papillons jaunes, annonciateurs de grands changements, voltige autour de lui. Son visage reste fardé de leur poussière incandescente. Il ne dit rien. Il ne dit jamais rien. Il s’assied au pied de mon lit. Ses bras sont des épines vertes qu’il enroule en collier autour de mon cou…
C’est par un hasard, un pur hasard que j’ai rencontré Nestor Bragamance. Dans la chaude odeur d’une fête où j’avais été entraînée le jour de mon anniversaire. Viens Tu ne peux pas rester seule Viens t’amuser. Les gens se préoccupent de mon bonheur. À la demi-clarté des lampes, les couples dansaient, et moi je m’ennuyais. J’ai farfouillé dans une pile de disques et j’ai trouvé ceux de Ferré. Tu te rappelles Nestor? J’ai changé la musique et tout s’est arrêté. Et tu es venu. Qui ose? Tu as dis Qui ose? Et c’était moi.
“Je t’ai rencontrée par hasard
Ici, ailleurs, ou autre part.
Il se peut que tu t’en souviennes…
Sans se connaitre, on s’est aimés,
Et même si ce n’est pas vrai,
Il faut croire à l’histoire ancienne…”
Je me souviens Nestor. Je me souviens de cette nuit passée dans ta petite voiture bleue. Nous avions deserté la fête, et nous avons fait la fête à deux, la nuit de ma fête à moi. J’avais dix-huit ans cette nuit là.
La nuit tourne autour de moi tel un manège. Elle s’arrête et se transforme en cette autre nuit où j’ai crié ton nom en touchant la place vide dans mon lit. Cette nuit où je t’ai attendu jusqu’à l’aube. Je me suis accroupie sur les draps défaits dans l’attente illusoire de te voir revenir, reparaître, et enfin j’ai cédé au désir de sommeil. Et quelle est cette voix qui m’appelle dans le petit jour pour me rappeller ton absence? Pourquoi s’est-il levé ce jour, pourquoi? Au milieu de la nuit, un rêve, rien qu’un rêve. Mais tu ne reviendras pas dans ce petit jour blême.
Avec toi est passé mon passé. Où est-il mon passé? Noyé dans cette nuit, égaré par mégarde? Comme ces mots qui s’effacent de l’écran de l’ordinateur et il faut tout recommencer. Mais il y a mille details oubliés…
Un baiser. Il y avait eu un baiser banal et quotidien. Un baiser à-plus-tard, un baiser je-reviens. Mais quelles étaient les dernières paroles? Le dernier regard? Pas celui que j’ai jeté sur ton visage à l’hôpital . On n’avait pas voulu que je te voie d’abord et j’ai dû supplier l’infirmière. Comment vous croire, ai-je demandé? Comment croire qu’il est mort si je ne le vois pas? Et elle a eu pitié, et derrière la vitre j’ai vu ton visage et comment l’oublier? Le dernier regard que l’on jette sur l’homme que l’on a tant aimé.
À quoi servent les yeux sinon à pleurer?
Je revois notre chambre. Peinte aux couleurs de lumière. Couleur des papillons de la Saint-Jean. Tu es né en Juin et tu disais souvent Quel beau cadeau d’anniversaire, cette nuée de papillons jaunes… Tu n’es pas revenu dans cette chambre. J’ai tout emporté un jour de cette piece. J’ai tout ôté. Et un soir, je me suis retrouvée seule dans une chambre vide, dévastée par ton absence. Et je me suis couchée à même le sol pour brailler mon malheur dans cette chambre de supplications, d’amour, d’attente vaine.
ô mon amour au goût d’orange
écorce amère dans ma bouche
ô feuilles séchées
je me souviens d’un jour de Juin
je me souviens
comment rester dans ce lit jusqu’au petit matin?
La balle t’a percé le coeur. Un petit point rouge. À quoi sert le coeur sinon à compter le temps de ton absence? Je n’ai ni froid, ni faim. Je ne vais pas répondre au téléphone. Je n’ouvrirai pas les lettres qui m’attendent sur la table. Je ne songerai pas aux nuits anciennes. Parce que ton souvenir me revient avec une telle violence que je me lève pour déchirer tes photos et effacer ta voix sur d’anciennes cassettes. Et je ne veux voir personne. Pourquoi dire ma peine à ceux qui passent? Le couteau dans mon coeur? Pourquoi gaspiller mon souffle et ma parole? Car le jour recommence. Les gens vont et viennent. J’ouvre le journal sur tous les malheurs du monde. Et le soleil se lève inéluctablement, le pâle soleil de Mars qui recommence le supplice épouvantable du temps qui passe. Comment ose-t-il passer? Qui ose? Je vais dire Qui ose?
Les jours qui ont suivi ton absence, ces images sont venues habiter mon obsession malgré moi:
Derrière mes paupières cousues à l’envers, petits losanges de satin rose aux points de fil blanc, se cachent des scorpions, des blattes, des cancrelats. Et de ces insectes que j’écrase à chaque cillement, coule un jus noir et épais. Mélasse amère. Larmes vénéneuses dont l’acide me ronge les joues…
Alors, j’ai fait silence autour de toi, silence. J’ai fait silence et encore silence.
Je revois tes mains sur le clavier du piano noir. Que j’oublie tout, sauf cela.
Mais l’eau de noix de coco, mise au frais pour se rafraîchir après l’amour? Les patates douces boucanées que nous mangions quand nous n’avions rien, rien que l’amour et l’eau. Et tu en faisais un festin. L’eau de coco devenait du vin, et les patates de l’amitié, on en faisait un miracle: il y en avait toujours assez pour tous ces amis qui remplissait cette maison de musique et de bruit.
Que j’oublie tout sauf la découverte à deux de Paris. Et le soir où nous avions raté le train et nous avons passé la nuit sur un banc à Juan les Pins. Et Venise au petit matin et la forêt d’Amazonie. Le pélerinage à Saut d’Eau, les tangos de Gardel et les fados de Lisbonne. Et en Grèce, il y a eu une coupure de courant à l’hotel ce soir là, et tu m’as laissé seule pour aller à la taverna. Et les escaliers de la grotte de Capri. Et ces nuits passées à ecouter le cri rauque du saxophone et les mélodies du piano dans les volutes de fumée et les rires, dans tous les bars de New York. Et je n’oublierai ni les colères ni les larmes, ni les drames. Les tu m’aimes? demandés à deux heures du matin; les portes claquées, et les retours; les Pardon, pardon mon amour… Combien de vies dans notre vie?
Alors qu’il n’y ait pas de prières sur ton nom. Qu’on ne chante aucun chant que ceux des fêtes. Je refuse tous chants funèbres , toutes prières sur toi. Ton nom est ma prière.
Et que m’importe s’ils ne comprennent rien, que m’importe? Qui dort seule le soir?
Que vais-je faire dans cette nuit plus longue qui m’enveloppe chaque jour. Que vais-je faire de ta mort sinon une chanson, un long poème? Allez, cette piece est jouée depuis longtemps. L’amour dont tu m’avais parée se fane et tombe en poussière.
Nestor est encore venu ce soir et, tantôt visible dans la lumière, tantôt caché dans l’ombre, il m’a semblé, en dépit de son silence, terriblement vivant.
À l’aube, j’ai enfin sombré dans un sommeil sans nuages. Quand je me suis reveillée, une fine poussière d’or poudrait les draps.
michèle voltaire marcelin
The Alchemy of Desire
Love is not the greatest glue between two people. Sex is. Tarun J. Tejpal
I would travel up and down her body, inhaling, inhaling,inhaling, hunting her secret source….
The room was dark and my mouth was everywhere and the white cotton she was wearing was crisp and thin and I was firm and insanely in love and she was wet and impossibly beautiful and our hands were potters and our flesh was clay; … and she was on the edge of the bed and I could smell her love and I could taste her love and I could hear her love and my love was straining for her love and then I was where I belonged and where I wanted to live and where I wanted to die and the world was a slip of skin and the word was liquid and the world was tight and the world was a furnace and the world was moving and the world was slipping and the world was exploding and the world was ending and the world was ending and the world had ended…
Rare is the male writer who can turn raw lust into poetry and describe sexual obsession so lyrically… Tejpal is that rara avis .
(Thanks to P. M. who made me discover this book)
michèle voltaire marcelin
Mensonge
Ils m’ont trompée. Rien ne meurt avec l’âge. Ni l’envie d’amour, ni celle des baisers. Et mon coeur fou me fait parfois oublier ce corps encombrant alourdi par les ans. Si facilement séduit pourtant, si passe de trop près, un homme aux yeux trop doux.
Et je tréssaille du même désir, cent fois retrouvé, quand un danseur me chavire, ses doigts agraffés à mon cou. Quelle chaleur soudain m’envahit à un éclat de rire? Me donne envie de mordre à pleines dents ces lèvres heureuses?
Ils m’ont menti. Je ne fais deuil de rien. J’ai dans mes jambes des envies de courses à perdre haleine dans les broussailles inondées de soleil, vert et ciel mélangés, cheveux défaits, épaules nues au vent. Des envies de culbutes aux membres emmêlés. De baisers dont la saveur serait celle de la pulpe des mangues, et m’empliraient la bouche de leur sirop de miel.
D’une langue qui aurait la fraîcheur de l’eau d’une fontaine. J’ai des envies de sexes durs comme du verre. Des envies de peau chaude et d’aisselles dont je lècherais le sel, et plus bas encore dans l’odeur de fougère. Je rêve à la brûlure si douce du sable à la plante des pieds. Du cri arraché au plaisir comme celui de l’oiseau soudain désencagé . J’ai dans mes mains des envies de caresses, dans mes oreilles, le doux gémir qui suit une nuque frôlée.
Et vous passez sans me voir , laissant flotter autour de moi votre parfum de bête libre. Sans savoir que mes yeux vous ont déjà appuyé contre ce mur, et mes bras cadenassé votre corps. Que je vous ai de la tête au pieds, comme une menthe, sucé . N’avez vous pas senti mes doigts dans vos cheveux?
Et du plus loin que je me garde, très loin de vous, lorsque je vous regarde, ne sentez-vous pas cette jouissance qui roule en moi ?
Vous ne savez donc pas qu’ils m’ont menti, ceux qui m’ont dit un jour, je serais plus tranquille?
