I find a diminutive plastic bag
On my kitchen counter
With a button in it
The kind that companies give you
Attached to a garment.

It’s a medium-size plastic button
With a shiny round edge.
It looks pretty important in there

And I debate what to do with it
whether to throw it in the trash
Or in the already full drawer

“Not the trash!“ it says to me
I’m an esthetically perfect creation
In a perfectly crafted plastic bag
With its scaled plastic seal.
Think of all it took to make us
Me and the bag.
Put me aside if you must,
but you’ll be happy to find me
The day your button fails!”

“But I don’t even know what piece of clothing
You come from” I answer.

And I try to picture the day
I lose a button
And look for a needle
And a thread,
And string the thread
In the needle,
And set to find the button
If I remember where I put it
Then sit down in broad daylight
And maybe look for my glasses
And finally get to sew the button
To whatever it is.
And it makes me very tired.

I’d rather write poems
Than spend my time sawing buttons.

“Look, if I listened to you
I would have to keep everything.
Think about:
The books I bought and have not read yet
And the magazines,
The earrings I never wore, and the rest
I can’t start saving buttons now.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

“Maybe you could recycle us?
Save us in a tin box like Grandma? For craft projects?
For a memory bead necklace?”

Nice try. Ludicrous.

I rail at clothing companies
The waste they engender,
The crime they push me to consider.

Then close my eyes, pretend that I am not doing it
And throw the perfect baggie in the trash.

I hear it scream in there.

Oh, the instinct of survival!

“Ok, ok, I’ll recycle you,”
In a poem.

* * *

I wish I could (always) write deep, sacred poems that would touch people from spirit to spirit, but inspiration is not always accommodating. The inspiration for this item I found lying on my kitchen counter.

This poem actually gathered some very positive reviews, as shared here:

“Critics strain for new superlatives in lauding debut of new New England poet.” – The New Yolk Thymes

“Emerging from a long development as a hidden chrysalis, V. H. effortlessly floats from American to French flowers, drinking the nectar of inspiration.” – The Aurelian

” “Seems, madam? Nay, it is. I know not seems.” Newcomer V. H. is a gifted artificer and conjurer who weaves a seamless fabric of observation and reflection as naturally flowing as a purling stream descending a gentle slope.” – The Journal of the International Ladies Garments Workers Union

There was one negative reaction:

“Her appeal to a sentimental nostalgia for a retrograde technology left us feeling as though we had been buttonholed by an advocate of Ecological Probity. – The Velcro Institute

One of my greatest joys when I was a little girl, eight or nine, was to receive in the mail the collection of writings published by the school. This was my grandmother’s village where I stayed during summer vacation, a very small town in the West of France, Brittany. The “gazette” came in the mail as a pile of duplicated papers bound together with staples. It smelled of solvent and the contributors’ handwriting had turned pink and purple. I would sit at my grandmother’s kitchen table and read the local school students and teachers’ prose, poems, letters, memoirs, drawings. It was so charming it moved me deeply. I realized I knew these people and felt closer to them than if I had met them in person.

In the Memoir section I put up Piano files. This is no Stephen King suspense and certainly not a page-turner. What I am serving here is not a story, just the life of a woman through the prism of piano. I could have seen it through other angles, such as writing, or food which I actually did (coming soon).

In Wim Wenders’ Wings of Desire, the two angels Damiel and Cassiel roam around Berlin, listening to the living, while invisible to them. This is what you would hear if you bent over my shoulder to hear my story. I would like to be one of those angels and listen to what people have to say as well.

Cramped in my narrow seat
Sandwiched between my daughter
And a man with a shirt striped with green
Who looks like he wouldn’t mind
Falling asleep on my shoulder.
In the dimmed cabin light
I consider the 7:40 hours flight ahead.
I feel tired, it’s been frantic
We ran around like there was no tomorrow
No tomorrow in France that is
And already we are leaving.

Soon I discover
A last minute gift from the gods
Ensconced in the reclining seat
In front of me:
A screen offering a selection
Of in-flight entertainment

I pick Chansons Françaises

Darting through the sky at 516 miles per hour
I sample the last sampler
Of things I didn’t have time to do
Life is short
But things accelerate
Between time zones
Forced rest and I fast forward

Je n’aurai pas le temps
Dit Michel Fugain
Chanté par un autre
Qui n’aura pas le temps non plus
Nous n’aurons pas le temps,
De tout faire.

Même en cent ans
Je n’aurai pas le temps,
Pas le temps.

 

THEATRE

Nous étions au théâtre, il m’avait laissée seule,
Pendant qu’il se changeait (il dirigeait l’orchestre)
Avait dit attends-moi, alors je suis restée
Entre quatre murs blancs fortement éclairés

Dans cette pièce nue, ni scène ni théâtre
J’étais seule et perdue dans une quatrième zone
Qui étais-je en ces lieux qui servaient de coulisses ?
Ni actrice ni danseuse, ni non plus spectatrice

A droite les escaliers, à gauche la sortie
Et en face une Bouche, un trou aux lèvres noires

La voix d’un haut-parleur sonnait de temps en temps
Puis un ou deux artistes passaient en coup de vent
Et sans peur par la bouche se faisaient avaler

Et si l’un d’eux devait, par un triste accident
Me pousser dans cet antre et m’emporter sur scène ?
J’avais des inquiétudes et me sentais zombie.

Et si un des gardiens me voyant en ces lieux
Oisive, décidait de m’envoyer dehors ?
Je me sentais bien mal, comme un couac dans l’orchestre

J’essayais tour à tour de trouver contenance
Etudiant les posters ornant certains des murs
Ou la boite de beignets vide trainant sur la table

Quand soudain j’ai senti les murs me regarder
Ils prenaient l’air méfiant et semblaient chuchoter
« Mais que fait-elle fait ici, sans pointes, ni tutu ? »

Que puis-je leur répondre me suis-je demandé
Qui suis-je ? Quel est mon rôle ? Hélas je n’en ai pas !
Sinon celui d’attendre, cela n’est pas assez.

Et puis j’ai eu, comme ça, un petit trait d’esprit
J’ai pensé à l’aimant sur le frigo chez moi
Qui disait « We are the hero of our own story »

Lors, j’ai levé la tête et regardé les murs
Et leur ai assené (ils en étaient bouche-bée)
« Qui suis-je ? Messieurs, qui suis-je ? Et bien veuillez apprendre
Que je suis l’héroïne de ma propre histoire,
Le personnage central de cette pièce-ci. »
J’ai levé un chapeau imaginaire, à plume
Et les ai salués, imitant Cyrano.
Et à partir de là les choses étaient faciles
Nous avons bavardé comme de vieux amis.

Je leur ai raconté mes épiques périples
Comme je venais de loin et par monts et par vaux
Par Paris, Columbus, Boston puis Seattle
En quête d’aventure, de sagesse et d’amour

Et que la destinée me faisait faire escale
En ce lieu imprévu, électrique et prenant.

Si le danseur fougueux de qui j’avais eu peur
M’avait poussé sur scène à cet instant précis
J’aurais sans hésiter fait quelques pas de danse
Et puis pris la parole et dit les mêmes mots.

Mais à ce moment-là mon hôte est revenu
Et saisissant mon bras emmené avec lui
Nous avons pris ensemble la sortie des artistes
Et avons pris congé sous les applaudissements.

J’ai eu la chance, cette année, de visiter le Pacific Northwest Ballet à Seattle pour une représentation remarquable (voir critique sur la page Stories de mon blog). Pendant que j’attendais Allan dans les coulisses, je regardais une boite de beignets qui se vidait très vite, moi qui croyais que les danseurs ne mangeaient que des carottes crues. Le poème de cette semaine est une narration, en alexandrins, non rimés, de mon expérience.

Top picture: Benoît-Constant Coquelin as Cyrano, photogravure by H. Dujardin after a watercolor by J. Guth

 

 

Dear Reader, you are reading  the first post on my first blog.

Pregnant silence.

That’s right, Veronique is blogging. On these pages, I plan to post one poem or story or piece of writing a week, until I run out of material or inspiration, which doesn’t seem likely at this point. I wrote so many poems and stories over the years that I do not know where to put them anymore. They spill from my computer drive, from my notebooks, from under my bed. I have to do something about it. I decided to put them up on the wall, online.

Oh, where to start! Difficult question.

This year has been most fabulous. Partly because I met a musician, a pianist, who put wind under my wings, so that suddenly I found myself considering and doing things I had never done before: buying an IPhone, flying to Seattle, starting a blog. I said partly, as I don’t want to put all the responsibility on him.
This first poem is not particularly esoteric. I subscribe to a classical music page on FaceBook, where I discovered that a running joke for musicians is that the world’s plague is Pachelbel’s Canon.  This shocked me and saddened me. Maybe it means that although I love classical music, I am not a professional musician. But I had to answer. Here it is:

* **

PACHELBEL CANON IN D

Dear “cellist” who was bored to death
During those gazillion weddings
When you had to play Pachelbel’s Canon
And the 8 notes you had to repeat 54 times :
D, A, B, F#, G, D, G, A
I am sorry to hear it was a chore to you
And I hope you found a better way to make a living.

And now if you don’t mind, I would like to replace
Your sad story with mine.

I don’t remember the material details
My studio in Angers, where the CD player was
What was on the CD cover photo
I am not certain about the window open
on the street market Place Imbach.

What I remember was that it was early in my life
Early enough to be spring,
But not early morning either
It was a grey spring morning with dew on the grass
When Pachelbel’s Canon started.
It was just an awakening,
It was a little like sunrise, and every gentle chord stroke
An arpeggio that drew a rainbow
On every dewdrop.

I remember that the sun slowly rose
And that nature was unfolding
Each blade of grass so distinct
Every leaf unfurling in the mint-green light
And I can swear that every single musician
In that specific recording
Was trying to tell me something:
That they were under the spell –
Especially the cello section –
That they wanted very hard to convey the message
That they would make me FEEL it
Whether I liked it or not.

And I do remember the lake
But not how I got there
And walking around it
Among the iridescent pearls of sound
Lining up and scintillating before trickling down to the grass
In gentle drops.
Each instrument brought its string in turn
To build the spider web’s spiral
Each competing with the next
To weave the most vivid tapestry
A thread of red silk, now golden, now bright green
Contrasted with a darker brown.
This multicolor universe was bathing me
In tones of green and woodsy notes and lifting fog.

And it was a slow crescendo,
As I stepped around the labyrinth.
Until the glory of noon made its entrance
And far too soon it was over

And still dizzy with the visions of the otherworld,
I had found my way back to this time of my youth.

I have not heard it very often since
But when I do
It is still spring in Angers.