Jude Stefan
epitaph of a jay
already the cattle in the shade of the stable
Ketou the dog playing in the pond
and the colt frolicking in the grass
in the distance a saw
forgot the day-off from school
walnut and apple trees awaiting their time
then the voices stopped
when the cats sleep in fresh armchairs
the breeze swells the sheets all in the present
of march when the hours sound at the bell tower
the child with a blue bucket fishes
a man wearing a cap with a glass on his knee
the voltairesque grandpa far from his passions smokes
you can’t, he says, lose the sun
(Translated from the French by Philip Kobylarz and Monique Manopoulos)
Jude Stefan
conveniences
bathrooms pissoires
like a storm that comes back to the location of its thunder
of workers’ voices in a garage all of our voices
caught in the duration of clouds
and maybe Maupassant sails in his balloon
and Schopenhauer plays his daily flute
voices of tired women succumbed
(bride blemished with milk)
in their boxes the dead wait patiently
contemplative poets defecate gray skies
strangely here at home among these tombs
where names fallen from our faces point
to our own undoing
where very suddenly a drunk dwarf bursts
into tears
(Translated from the French by Philip Kobylarz and Monique Manopoulos)
