(birth)day gift of love
What can a poor poet do if pleasure is her true vocation If she knows that laughter is the last defense of freedom? A poet never knows for certain these days how to save a soul from the torments of remorse Maybe that’s why love floods through her chest and inoxerably upon finding it she’ll […]
Nightclub
by Billy Collins You are so beautiful and I am a fool to be in love with you is a theme that keeps coming up in songs and poems.There seems to be no room for variation. I have never heard anyone sing I am so beautiful and you are a fool to be in love […]
birdtrap
there’s something special in your glass and in your eyes i have to be careful not look at you too much i could be snared like a bird in a trap unless i scorch my heels running away from you michèle voltaire marcelin
let me be
let me be i want to live truly the truth of my loving with a silk rose at my throat a black shawl around my hips and a hand on my heart’s wound dear love, i don’t complain it’s just another scar but let me be i want to die with a song on my […]
stray dog bar
through the rain i hurried to the stray dog bar to meet you but you never came tonight i will drink five star rum eat peppers till my eyes water no one will know the burning of my heart or my tears are caused by your absence michele voltaire marcelin
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
wing song
you feel entitled to this i know it is yours now a gift you did not expect but cling to and do not want to let it go this woman open-winged alive to kisses and dreams longing for you like an impatient hallelujah or a belated birthday with candles wishes wishes wishes moonlight singing in […]
insomnia
night flows endlessly between my eyelids refusing to enter i cannot sleep and have started to count lovers instead of sheep some names i do declare escape me and some i will confess blessed me some flung their love at me while others slipped it behind me gentle like a shadow and once i found […]
a different sky
last night i saw the moon and a lone star magnificent and new and i did not call you to sing its beauty your life so separate from mine we do not even share the darkness of the sky michèle voltaire marcelin
living
you tell me it is too much that light i say too much i am too much please say that at my funeral excessive yes extravagant but say also how much i loved you how much with heart open and hands to touch and feel not enough eyes to see lips to kiss or mouths […]
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.