La lumière de ses yeux
“Oeil gauche Espoir, Oeil droit Combat”
Dans le jour malade
La peine est indefinissable
Et les amis sans alibi
Mais malgré les promesses trahies
Et ceux qui meurent les mains nues
Il reste la lumière de ses yeux
Oeil gauche Espoir, Oeil droit Combat… [La lumière de ses yeux – Michèle Voltaire Marcelin]
A dress and a dream
“Fashion is not something that exists in dresses only. Fashion is in the sky, in the street, fashion has to do with ideas, the way we live, what is happening.” Coco Chanel Last fall, I was walking the streets of Brooklyn, looking here and there, at this storefront and that, strolling aimlessly until I was […]
The Red Dress
I want a red dress. I want it flimsy and cheap, I want it too tight, I want to wear it until someone tears it off me. I want it sleeveless and backless, this dress, so no one has to guess what’s underneath. I want to walk down the street past Thrifty’s and the hardware […]
Stones in the sun
Voices from Haiti INNERview with screen sisters Edwidge Danticat and Michèle Voltaire Marcelin ~ written by Katia D. Ulysse Multi-talented powerhouses Edwidge Danticat and Michèle Voltaire Marcelin deliver outstanding performances in Patricia Benoit’s debut film, Wòch nan Solèy (Stones in the sun). The movie premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival recently. Audiences in the DC Metro area had a […]
Portrait of the actress
“A portrait! What could be more simple and more complex, more obvious and more profound.” ~ Charles Baudelaire. Monday evening found me sitting for a portrait for photographer Leslie Jean-Bart. As part of his latest creative series, Leslie requested each “sitter” come with a significant personal object. I chose a Venetian mask I […]
Amores y cosas sin importancia
Prólogo de la edicíon en español del libro de poesía de Michèle Voltaire Marcelin “Amours et Bagatelles” traducido por Mirta Fernández Martínez por la editorial Arte y Literatura. “La literatura haitiana contemporánea ha hecho eclosión, ha alcanzado una dimensión enorme por la gran cantidad de nuevos autores importantes, por la diversidad de temas tratados y […]
Stones don’t bleed
It is time the stone made an effort to flower said Celan It is time it bled red I say And love And love And love flowed out of its wound for ever and ever Amen The calendar says September but why so short the time to dance The pace of clocks has been quickened […]
Birdflight
When I was told I was to die Such beauty I witnessed in the sky Birds dancing round and round A flurried dance of feathers Pale as the clouds Such beauty I witnessed I want to die like a bird in autumn In full flight Sweet with song Michèle Voltaire Marcelin
caresse de demoiselle
dans l’incendie des roses qui brûlent le jardin je vis pieds nus quelle merveille je regarde encore le calendrier d’août malgré les rumeurs vaines l’été est hors d’haleine je viens à vous déshabillée en chair de femme ma peau en feu comme un soir couleur de pêche mes cheveux fous en auréole d’ombellifères tout embaumée […]
Rain
behind mountains more mountains behind sorrows more sorrows and hunger rain or shine the wind howls and rain comes again and again falls dark and blind morning same as evening every year the same and all the months the same since i saw the light there is no god no god to watch over me […]
Goodbye Senhor Saramago
“I insist that everything is biography. Everything is life: lived, painted and written.” José Saramago Saramago is a wild herbaceous plant whose leaves, in difficult times, served as nourishment for the poor. Saramago is also a literary genius. These definitions are not mutually exclusive since José Saramago, the Portuguese writer who died this morning, also […]
Welcome to Haïti
I’m home. This landscape is mine: the fruit merchants, the colored vans, the dust. The heat is mine; the late sun. I’m home.
love grows
love grows in this quiet house love grows with every gesture we are safe here in this sweet forever weaving breathless moments into hours spreading our treasures in the darkened room singing a sanctified sanctifying song when lust and laughter come together as we do intertwining we rise and fall and rise again and come […]
‘The Thing’
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, whole 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.
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 […]
Lost and Found
” Lost and Found “ is the book of love. A CD of 25 poems chosen among the 74 in the collection is included with the text . There is an intimist tone to these poems and one can feel the poet giving herself entire to her devotion toward love. Contrary to the tone of […]
clair de lune
my love i will give you all i have saved for you joyful gifts groves clustered with flowers filled with bird cries mountains hidden behind other mountains and seas older than the earth itself my love, take the hand of this woman who knows not her left from her right yet knows unerringly the way […]
love is in season
now has love come in my heart love unending listen how lovely the birds sing ushering the clear light of may careless forsythias bloom sudden yellowness everywhere i proclaim our love as boldly in the goldenness of this day my love has the gentlest eyes a fragrance of leaves and grass i’m reborn in beautyness in the blessedness of […]
springtime
this is the way that love began spring opened with your name with pollen-powdered flowers and leaves tangled green in the after-scent of rain fish flowed as freely as kisses all bloomed luminous and startling a miracle of the world so beautiful it’s spring again again i count the days the months endlessly passing through […]
shattered glass
words casually falling from your mouth glass clumsily slipping from your hands shards of words splinters of glass because you do not witness blood because the tears dry quickly you do not think i suffer michèle voltaire marcelin
talisman
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 […]
dream deferred
you bring me your love like a present and say wait to open it wait with lowered voice till the right day the day of mercy some hallelujah morning you bring me your love neatly wrapped with a bow with a calendar attached when you should unleash a thousand wild stars loosen the twittering […]
haïti, holy republic of all attempts…
This bilingual piece, adapted from the play “Dialogue with my Double” and various poems by Carmelle St.Gérard Lopez is a patchwork of activist literature – where for an hour and a half, there is intense communication between the audience and the stage. Punctuated by songs composed and interpreted by Maryse Coulanges, the text explores the […]
love is blind
does he love you you asked does he love you like i love you does he does he you are so beautiful and sad does he wrap himself in your skin looking for the missing perfume of wild roses falling apart in the wind does he lose himself in the jungle of your hair say […]
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.