Je t’écrivais…
Je t’écrivais des cartes postales pour tous
les jours.
Deux le vendredi donc à cause du dimanche.
Des crocus coloriaient la neige sur la dernière
que tu as vue.
Tes doigts devaient trembler à tenir le
croissant, et des miettes seront tombées sur
la neige.
Mais pour la carte postale du lundi elle est
restée dans l’enveloppe dans ta poche dans le
cercueil dans le caveau dans la terre, père gigogne.
Translations of this Poem
I was writing...
Translator: Donny O’Rourke
I was writing you post cards for each
of the days.
Two on Friday on account of Sunday.
Crocuses would have coloured in the snow on the
last one you saw.
Your fingers must have shaken as you held the
croissant, and some crumbs will have fallen on
the snow.
But as for Monday’s card it remains in its
envelope in your pocket in the coffin in the vault in
the earth, father enfolded within.
About this poem
The Scottish Poetry Library in partnership with the Institut français d’Ecosse invited Jacques Rancourt, director of the annual Festival franco-anglais de poésie and editor of La Traductière, to choose about twenty poems from the last twenty years to be circulated to four Scottish poets, who would then choose twelve poems to translate.
M. Rancourt and Magi Gibson, David Kinloch, Brian McCabe and Donny O’Rourke gathered in the Scottish Poetry Library on 15 December 2002 for a concentrated day of translation, re-working and working on the poems they’d chosen, with advice from M. Rancourt and in discussion with each other. This collegial approach was different from the usual practice of showing work to one or two friends in its intensity of focus and level of exchange.
