Under A Certain Little Star
by Wislawa Szymborska I apologize to coincidence for calling it necessity. I apologize to necessity just in case I’m mistaken. Let happiness be not angry if I take it as my own. Let the dead not remember they scarcely smolder in my memory. I apologize to time for the muchness of the world overlooked per […]
forever
Night has come again and brought you to my door i tell you plain in this pale yellow corridor years cannot be longer than the days i’ve missed you ah, my love, encircle me in your arms and keep me there forever well, as long as forever can last days are shorter now that summer […]
my idea of paradise
we laid in bed you beside me in the heart of darkness laughing freely and you held me naked under my dress like a leaf hidden safely in another so easily the world regained its tenderness michèle voltaire marcelin
bonjour tendresse
come it is night i’ve put ribbons in my hair for you to unravel there is wine to drink until we drink our eyes there are mussels and cockles to suck and eat until we lick each other’s salt you bless me with nights of love and sleep and when day claims my eyes you […]
lettre d’amour
darling, the letter said i will conceal nothing i am wild about you can’t you understand i’m on fire missing you last night i was in some dark alleyway in my dream suddenly it overflowed with light when you appeared and i woke up saying your name darling, there’s a fire under the moon […]
stone field
you say i do not sing of joy but of sorrow you say each word is a reproach each a stone you say rest that fierceness erase that debt i see the sky change to fire lighting up my empty bed michèle voltaire marcelin
absolutely
if you should think of me later and recall our time together do not count in months, no, not in numbers count in love and in pain, in tenderness count in silence and the weight of absence remember how the scent of you found its way through my hair how i enfolded your body through […]
one day
one day we will go to paris and sit in a café and drink wine when the sky flowers rose-red and paints shadows on the ground we will kiss on the bridge where apollinaire sang of love-pains on the seine we’ll be rodolfo and mimi in la bohème and have poetry and bread in a […]
the promise
children die do not talk to me about prayer or paradise talk is cheap children die and my anger supercedes my grief remember it was a november morning like any other when the plaster the bricks the mortar came crashing down children die under the rubble of the promise women cry the air is as […]
Hope
I don’t know about you but I have such a wildness of butterflies fluttering around in my stomach, their buoyant force could make me float. Each carrying a “What if…?” thought. And lately, I have been waking up humming Nina’s tune. Can you wait for Wednesday? Because I can’t… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBiAtwQZnHs “Can’t you see it Can’t […]
Man thinking about Woman
some thing is lost in me- like the way you lose old thoughts that somehow seemed unlost at the right time. i’ve not known it or you many days; we met as friends with an absence of strangeness. it was the month that my lines got longer & my metaphors softer. it was the week […]
The reason why
Analyst ask why. Dog say hungry. Analyst say your flesh and blood. Dog say I know. I not proud. Analyst ask about puppyhood. Dog say tough. Not enough food. Dog eat dog. Analyst say ah. That’s why dog eat dog. Dog say thanks. Dog pay. Dog go home. Dog hungry. Dog eat dog. Adam Taylor
masquerade
first i will cry then i will lose sleep over you and go quite mad for a few weeks covering my head with ashes dressing in sicilian widow’s weeds i will not care for food or drink my friends will not know what to think i’ll sing sad songs in the mirror trying a range […]
All of a sudden
Everything happened all of a sudden. All of a sudden daylight beat down on the earth; There was the sky all of a sudden; All of a sudden steam began to rise from the soil. There were tendrils all of a sudden, buds all of a sudden. And there were fruits all of a sudden. […]
Sonnet
by June Jordan Supposing we could just go on and on as two voracious in the days apart as well as when we side by side (the many ways we do that) well! I would consider then perfection possible, or else worthwhile to think about. Which is to say I guess the costs of long […]
absence
i say i am fragile brittle like glass today i say i miss you you tell me there are 8 million people in the city 30 i see each day why is it then your absence turns my heart into a wasteland? michèle voltaire marcelin
Intimates
Don’t you care for my love? she said bitterly. I handed her the mirror, and said: Please address these questions to the proper person! Please make all requests to head-quarters! In all matters of emotional importance please approach the supreme authority direct! So I handed her the mirror. And she would have broken it over […]
Poem for the Men of Our Time
Beloved life, my death takes its time. What shall I tell my man, What trip shall I propose? Kings, ministers And all of you politicians, What word beside gold and shadow Stays in your ears? Beside your capacity What do you know Of men’s souls? Gold, conquest, profit, success And our bones And our people’s […]
C’est la vie
On summer afternoons I sit Quiescent by you in the park, And idly watch the sunbeams gild And tint the ash-trees’ bark. Or else I watch the squirrels frisk And chaffer in the grassy lane; And all the while I mark your voice Breaking with love and pain. I know a woman who would give […]
honest mistake
Betcha thought you got the serious one didn’t ya you let the glasses and the books fool ya but ya got the one who sings a capella in the mirror like a blind girl at the fair with her cotton-candy hair whisperin’ prayers in the air as she lays her feelings bare and ya know […]
Happy Thursday?
Michele, Temar and Francesca Sometimes you don’t need a reason Not a birthday Not a holiday Just celebrating the day that is The friends that are New and old And the music that makes it all Allright…. Or as poet Lucille Clifton writes: come celebrate with me that everyday something has tried to kill me […]
lost and found
i learned the sorrowful craft of love when i was exiled from you i sought you in vain for so long traveling with your name a crumpled paper in my hand unfolding a map of your land asking no directions following the wind ghosts do you believe in ghosts do you believe how hope can […]
Mothering me
Right foot, left foot, right foot, left foot, I’d say when I held my children’s soft warm hands, teaching them to walk. At forty, I say the words to myself, right foot, left foot, right foot, left foot, I force my feet to move through sad days of divorce and lonely love affairs. I long […]
some days
providence is sweet to me some days when i come in rush and bliss a morning prayer on my lips my body to claim your soul i know that you hear my song some days there are trees that stand for love filled with birds and leaves afire there’s a moon glowing above pink skies […]
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.