Mute Objects of Expression (10 page)

3. But at the same time this violent scent, which carries far; this oracle, eyes popping; this violent perfume, almost animal, through which the flower seems to gush out . . .

. . . And so, since it gushes out of its container, let's bid it goodbye till next spring!

Florabundant top-of-their-lungs tender-feathered
From a thicket to the core stirred by the mere
Approach beneath the azure of man's memory
Nostrils wide breathing in their oracles,
A billion chicks cheeping, chirping gold.

Mimosa
(variants incorporated)
Pungent top-of-their-lungs tender-feathered
Cheeping, they cheep of gold the glorious chicks
The azure nostrils wide breathes in their oracles
By the mute authority of its splendor

 

Florabundant top-of-their-lungs belying their plumes
Lamenting the thicket aggrieved to the core
By the violet austerity of your splendor
Azure nostrils wide breathing in their oracles

 

Florabundant pungent tender-feathered
Cheeping, they cheep of gold the glorious chicks.

MIMOSA

FLORABUNDANT TOP-OF-YOUR-LUNGS BELYING YOUR PLUMES UNDONE FROM A THICKET AGGRIEVED TO THE CORE

BY A TERRIBLE AUTHORITY OF DARKNESS

THE AZURE BREATHING IN YOUR ORACLES NOSTRILS WIDE CHEEP VAINGLORIOUS CHICKS YOU CHEEP OF GOLD

 

THE PINE WOODS NOTEBOOK

The pleasure of pine woods:

One can roam about at ease there (among tall trunks that look something between bronze and rubber). They are well-stripped. Of all low branches. There's no anarchy, no tangle of vines, no encumbrance. One can sit right down there, stretch out at ease. A carpet prevails over it all. A few stray rocks supply furnishings, a few flowers hug the ground. A purportedly healthy atmosphere prevails, a discreet and tasteful scent, a vibrant yet gently pleasing musicality.

The great violet masts, still encrusted with lichen and bark that's furrowed, scaley.

Their branches strip off and the trunks slough their bark.

These great trunks, all of a perfectly defined species. These tall African masts, or at very least Creole.

 

Easy roaming about between these tall masts, African or at very least Creole, their bark and lichen reaching midway up, solemn as bronze, supple as rubber.

(I wouldn't say
robust,
as that adjective generally refers to another tree species.)

No tangle of cords, none of vines, no floorboards but deep carpets on the ground.

Robust
refers more to another sort of tree, yet the pine
is so
nonetheless, though more than any other it can bend without breaking . . .

A shaft and a cone and its conical fruit.

Amid the profusion . . . At the base of these great masts, African or at very least Creole, there are no entanglements, no encumbrance of vines or ropes, no washed floorboards on the ground, but a deep carpet.

From the base to midway up, crinkled and lichen-cloaked . . .

Not one snaking vine or cord to hamper the stroller amid the profusion of these great trunks, African or at very least Creole, from base to midway up still lichen-cloaked.

Stripped of branches (to midway up), both by their own single-minded concern for the green peak (the green cone of their peak) and by the grave obscurity devised jointly in their midst . . .

That's how it happens that even birds are relegated to the heights.