against my will
artwork: katarina vavrova
against my will
there’ll come a day
when the sudden nearness of you
will not be greeted by a song
words circling around my head
behind my eyelids
pushing their way
past my teeth
i will ask what lies
between your body and mine
what memories
i can’t erase with my skin
even as my breath flies inside you
and we don’t know whose scent is whose
lovers should take their bodies
with them when they leave
and not leave them behind
with treacheries of the past
and miseries of daily life forgotten
glossed over by absence
emerging later
with newly discovered souls
and verities
saying
our house
our children
our bed
our life
claiming back their place
i am but a squatter in your heart
with my bare self
inventing our current existence
step by step
so much distance to cover
time lost and found and lost again
our chosen life
ours to hold but for a while
love is not for the faint of heart
breathing in and out
irregular heartbeats
marking the time
a hand on a drum
marking wishes
that can’t be spoken outloud
squandering feelings
trying to remember
what it was like
to live with whom and whose
habitual hands closed your eyes
and the comfort of old clothes
this dreaming does not end
what happened once happens again
against my will
i’d set fire to my name
leaving nothing to salvage
no trace of my passage
in the temporary shelter of your heart
against my will
i’d dance in the wreckage
under the eviction notice
michele voltaire marcelin
2 Responses to “against my will”
Leave a Comment
Archives
Subscribe to Lidous via Email
jmc strategies
- Primer on the Anti-Immigrant Forces Determined to Hijack American Politics
- Immigration: Waiting for Godot Need Not Be Policy
- Baby Doc is Dead, Duvalierism Lives On
- Human Rights in Haiti in the Manigat Era
- Dealing With Statelessness in the Dominican Republic
- Haiti: It Started with a Bang…
- The Duvalier Case: What Is at Stake at the Court of Appeals
- Another day of reckoning for Jean Claude Duvalier?
- Will Duvalier’s Victims Have Their Day in Court?
- Will Duvalier Regain Access to Illicit Funds Pilfered from the Haitian Treasury?
Michèle Voltaire Marcelin is a poet/writer, performer and painter who was born and raised in Haiti, sojourned in Chile, and currently lives in the United States. The publication of her first novel “La Désenchantée” (CIDIHCA, Montréal-2006) was followed by its Spanish translation “La Desencantada” and two other books of poetry and prose: “Lost and Found” and “Amours et Bagatelles” (CIDIHCA, Montréal-2009) - translated into Spanish by Editorial ALBA as "Amores y cosas sin importancia" - all of which garnered rave reviews. Her writings are also featured in 3 anthologies published in France: "Cahier Haiti" (published by RAL'M-2009), "Terre de Femmes" (Editions Bruno Doucey-2011) "Revue Intranqu'îllités" (2012). She speaks and writes fluently French, English, Spanish and Haitian Creole. She has a BFA from the Leonard Davis Center for the Performing Arts at CUNY and a Masters from The New School for Social Research.
Out of this river of ashes
we shall swim
aware
barely breathing
waiting
eager
knowing
GAU
And for your love
I picked the still burning ashes
-that’s what’s left-
to paint your name
on the bleeding forehead
of my thoughts.
I know you won’t miss much.
You’re well acquainted with the touch
of the velvet hand behind the mirror
that saved the letters of your name
you painted once with lipstick.
I’m just the man who lost you
in the cinders, who still believes
one day the sea will dry all up
to let your name shine once again
on the ephemeral sand
to dissipate the sadness that’s my life.
OZ