Birago Diop – Spirits

Listen to Things

More often than Beings,

Hear the voice of fire,

Hear the voice of water.

Listen in the wind,

To the sighs of the bush;

This is the ancestors breathing.

Those who are dead are not ever gone;

They are in the darkness that grows lighter

And in the darkness that grows darker.

The dead are not down in the earth;

They are in the trembling of the trees

In the groaning of the woods,

In the water that runs,

In the water that sleeps,

They are in the hut, they are in the crowd:

The dead are not dead.

Listen to things

More often than beings,

Hear the voice of fire,

Hear the voice of water.

Listen in the wind,

To the bush that is sighing:

This is the breathing of ancestors,

Who have not gone away

Who are not under earth

Who are not really dead.

Those who are dead are not ever gone;

They are in a woman’s breast,

In the wailing of a child,

And the burning of a log,

In the moaning rock,

In the weeping grasses,

In the forest and the home.

The dead are not dead.

Listen more often

To Things than to Beings,

Hear the voice of fire,

Hear the voice of water.

Listen in the wind to

The bush that is sobbing:

This is the ancestors breathing.

Each day they renew ancient bonds,

Ancient bonds that hold fast

Binding our lot to their law,

To the will of the spirits stronger than we

To the spell of our dead who are not really dead,

Whose covenant binds us to life,

Whose authority binds to their will,

The will of the spirits that stir

In the bed of the river, on the banks of the river,

The breathing of spirits

Who moan in the rocks and weep in the grasses.

Spirits inhabit

The darkness that lightens, the darkness that darkens,

The quivering tree, the murmuring wood,

The water that runs and the water that sleeps:

Spirits much stronger than we,

The breathing of the dead who are not really dead,

Of the dead who are not really gone,

Of the dead now no more in the earth.

Listen to Things

More often than Beings,

Hear the voice of fire,

Hear the voice of water.

Listen in the wind,

To the bush that is sobbing:

This is the ancestors, breathing

fictive beat

W/O/M/A/N
gone into abstraction
gitane smoke before the rain,
cello case velvet interior
soft and firm

W/O/M/A/N
breasts and silk once seen on canvas
could not concede to his kisses
or arch of bow
he had to wander

W/O/M/A/N
no more companion
than those strings he manipulated
with fingers callused,
she will not tremor

W/O/M/A/N
as absent as the background
waiting for a taxi,
rain effective conduit
to her misery,
he sheltered the cello
with umbrella
heading to a jazz club

W/O/M/A/N
is the beat
is the tender thrum,
a cello’s true heart
and poets calling,
absinthe and kisses
parted stocking thighs
he had found another
W/O/M/A/N

Musician in the Rain by Robert Doisneau

 

 

camomile artist

this voice of the river
pressed wavelets to the hull,
kisses gentle
as the heat of day waned,
there is an island
he took himself to
and revealed not to many,
his sister stretched her hand
to the surface,
his obsession that yellow obsession
of scrawled canvas
becoming painfully light
each coming and passing day,
his work confessional
to a degree that
his lips where bitten into scabs
and fingernails worn,
absinthe stained his teeth
and confounded the workings
of an already fractured mind,
he wanted to show
one person the accommodation
crooked walls hung with works
salons would faint at,
not his usual pastorals and portraits,
this was a diminished reality
with a lot of truth
his sarcasm would not yield
afraid of her reaction
progressed slowly
yesterday still had a grip,
he could not release
approaching jetty
tremors worked in his arms,
breathing quickened,
when the moon set
he would be revealed
and her pain would be no loss,
when the rains came
he would return alone
clouds would cover the moon
and deny reflection and illumination
there was a lot more to be done

John Singer Sargent – Autumn on The River 1889