Marie-Claire Bancquart
(translated by Wendy Hardenberg)
Paroles
Exorcisées de l’essentiel
marchant
de faille en faille
barrées
par des vols d’oiseaux
nos paroles du moins étaient comme un silence
de dormeur qui rêve au silence
en plein fracas des bulldozers.
Words
Exorcised of the essential
marching
from flaw to flaw
criss-crossed
by flights of birds
at least our words were like the silence
of a sleeper who dreams of silence
amid the roar of bulldozers.
Marie-Claire Bancquart (b. 1932) is a prolific and prize-winning French poet, novelist, essayist, and critic, as well as a Professor Emeritus of French literature at the Sorbonne (Université de Paris-IV). Wendy Hardenberg translates her poetry because it’s like getting to write it.