Cœurs, comme livres d’amour

[Hearts, Books of Love poems translated by Susanna Lang]

Cœur :

                        tache sombre – ou claire

                        vaste empreinte

                        enveloppe où pèse le sang

terre enserrée

un scribe entaille le rocher.

Septembre dans la poche, le paysage

abandonne son labeur, les feuilles tombent

comme des mots sur la poitrine du sourd

le vent ne soulève plus que des fantômes

qui s’engouffrent parmi les écailles du passé.

Le soir descend l’ondée de rose et de mauve.

Dans ce geste léger, je pose ma tête sur l’oreiller

je te rejoins pour faire face à mon cœur.

Heart:

                        dark stain – or light

                        vast imprint

                        envelope weighed down with blood

earth enclosed

a scribe cuts into the rock.

September in the bag, the land

abandons its labor, the leaves fall

like words on a deaf man’s chest

the wind raises nothing but phantoms

that bury themselves among the scales of the past.

Evening brings down a shower of rose and mauve.

With this slight gesture, I lay my head on the pillow

I rejoin you so as to encounter my heart.

La pluie tache le paysage

octobre, comme une ondée de feuilles

un frisson, la secousse puissante

des timbales explosent

à la figure de notre maigre histoire.

                        Le monde se hâte vers nulle part.

                        La pointe de mes mots soulève des ombres

                        qui m’effraient, et les fumées des blessures

ne se dissipent pas. Ce qui a été

ce qui est et sera, mon cœur, qui

mieux que toi contiens l’infini

recouvres le temps, regardes au-delà, brûles

ma propre absence?

Rain stains the landscape

October, like a shower of leaves

a shiver, the powerful shock

kettledrums explode

in the face of our meager history.

                        The world hurries off to nowhere.

                        The tip of my words stirs up shadows

                        that frighten me, and the fumes of wounds

do not dissipate. What has been

what is and will be, my heart, who

better than you contains the infinite

blankets time, looks into the beyond, sets fire

to my own absence?

Le sapin rouillé de novembre, le bois

qui bientôt brûlera

dans la cheminée de décembre, le monde

s’il recommence, mon amour, entre tes mains

                        – secousses, repos perdu, lente misère

                        fumées de sang, chaînes aux chevilles –

la porte du théâtre s’ouvre

et les mots se vident et les mots se remplissent.

Vie frêle, dénuée

d’éternité, où donc

et comment recommencer?

The rusty fir of November, the wood

that will soon burn

in December’s fireplace, the world

if it begins again, my love, in your hands

                        – shocks, lost rest, slow depletion

                        blood fumes, chained ankles –

the theater door opens

and the words empty out and the words fill up again.

Frail life, stripped

of eternity, where

and how can we begin again?

Le ciel s’embrouille, déjà, rassemble ses ombres

de novembre, promène ses gris cassants.

Des oiseaux hostiles fendent le jour

– et le ciel, et le cœur, ainsi

se murent, et leur appel même

ignore le rivage.

                        N’effleure-t-il l’aube qu’à peine

                        pour revenir à sa nuit?

Alors on pourrait marcher

sans jamais avancer – sans jamais trouver le monde –

on pourrait secouer nos longues ailes effilochées

en regardant l’arbre

dont les feuilles se sont égouttées

on pourrait ne recueillir aucune trace

ne jamais toucher le cœur.

The sky is muddled, already, gathers its November

shadows, parades its brittle grays.

Hostile birds rend the day

– and the sky, and the heart,

close themselves off, and even their call

knows nothing of the shore.

                        Doesn’t the sky just touch the dawn

                        so it can return to its night?

We could walk in this way

without ever advancing – without ever reaching the world –

we could beat our long frayed wings

as we watch the tree

whose leaves have drained

we might not retain any trace

might never touch the heart.

Le feu de décembre brûle l’année

les cendres déjà s’amoncellent.

                        Tu ranges tes carnets

                        tu refermes les livres.

Derrière toi, les pas

– tantôt encore si proches –

deviennent méconnaissables, les jours

en ont changé les traits, révélé la lourdeur.

L’horloge sonne minuit – l’amour

un champ d’heures

où trébuche et résiste et tombe et s’embrase

l’histoire de nos pas -, de nouveau

tu ensemenceras la terre amoindrie.

December’s fire consumes the year

its ashes already banked.

                        You put away your notepads

                        you close your books.

Behind you, the steps

– so near a moment ago –

become unrecognizable, the days

have changed their appearance, made us feel their weight.

The clock strikes midnight – love

a field of hours

where the history of our footsteps

stumbles and resists and falls and catches fire – once again

you will sow the impoverished earth.

Sur ton épaule, peu à peu ma mémoire craquelle.

Les mouettes précèdent les lourds hivers

– tempêtes du corps, orages du cœur et de l’âme –

cherchent le rivage, cherchent la proche semence.

                        Effrayée par ma solitude

                        comme l’oiseau par le reflet de son vol

                        je cogne ma tête contre la vitre. Le jour

                        se déchire, laisse s’avancer la blessure à guérir.

Patiemment tu souffles sur le givre

qui embue les fenêtres de ma maison :

ébranler les cloisons, abattre les murs, desceller

la source, mot à mot, retrouver l’ordonnance secrète

– la ligne hésitante du commencement.

Et dans l’immense paysage, une vie

où nous ne faisons que vivre.

My memory fragments little by little against your shoulder.

Gulls arrive before a heavy winter

– tempests in the body, storms in the heart and soul –

they look for the shore, for the next field to be sown.

                        Alarmed by my solitude

                        like the bird by the reflection of its flight

                        I beat my head against the glass. The light

                        comes apart, deepens the injury to be healed.

You breathe patiently on the frost

that clouds the windows of my house:

shake the walls, bring down the bearing walls, unseal

the source, word by word, uncover the secret rule

– the hesitant line of the beginning.

And in the immense landscape, a life

where all we do is live.

Hélène Dorion was born in Québec in 1958. From the publication of her first book to receiving the Athanase-David Prize in 2019, the highest distinction awarded by the Quebec government in literature, Hélène Dorion has published more than thirty-five works. Her poetry, novels, essays, and children’s picture books have been published in some fifteen countries and have earned her several distinctions, including the Governor General’s Award, the Mallarmé Prize, the Charles-Vildrac Prize, the Anne-Hébert Prize, the Aliénor Prize, the Léopold-Senghor Prize, and the Catullo Prize.

With her book of poems, Mes forêts, Hélène Dorion is the first living woman and first Quebecer to appear in the French baccalaureate program.

A multidisciplinary artist, she wrote the libretto for the opera Yourcenar – Une île de passions, presented by the Opéra de Montréal and the Opéra de Québec in 2022, with the late Marie-Claire Blais. She regularly exhibits her photographs, designs and presents literary concerts, in addition to collaborating with composers and writing song lyrics. She is also the author of some fifteen artist books. She was included in the Larousse dictionary and in Le Robert.

In 2024, her novel, Not Even the Sound of a River, was published by Gallimard/Folio. That same year, she received the Grand Prix de Poésie of the Académie Française for her entire poetic oeuvre. In 2025, Gallimard Editions published A Face Leaning Against the World and Other Poems in the prestigious “Poetry” collection. Her novel Days of Sand was published that same year by Folio/Gallimard.