These words, here before me,
Carry meanings, so free.
That phrase, over there,
Evokes images, so rare.
This sentence, so precise,
Paints a picture, concisely.
Those expressions, beyond,
Stir emotions, so fond.
I ponder these terms,
Their elegance, it yearns.
You hear them, so clearly,
Their impact is so near.
The rhythm of speech,
These words, they implore.
Flowing, ebbing, with grace,
Captivating this space.
In the dance of langue,
Beauty's song is sung.
Words that enchant, enrapture,
Their power, they capture.
These symbols are so bold,
Truths they unfold.
Repainting the world,
With hues, ever true.
Oh, the beauty of words,
Their splendour, is stirred.
In this language, so grand,
I find joy, close at hand.
Categories:
langue, appreciation, celebration, joy, words,
Form: Rhyme
I do not speak another language…
I use to think, if I had the chance,
I would choose French, Italian or Spanish…
you know…the languages of romance.
But over the years of taking a walk
at the beginning of each day…
I now wish I spoke the language of nature…
and understood what she is trying to say.
I wish I knew the language of the birds that soar across the sky
and all the creatures that swim under the seas…
I wish I knew the langue of the flowers, the mountains,
the rivers and the trees.
I wish I knew the language of the wind and the rain
as they flow by me through the air…
If I could speak their language…imagine all the secrets…
all the knowledge they could share.
Yes, now as I take my morning walks
I wish I had the chance
to learn how to communicate in natures tongue…
the one true language of romance.
Categories:
langue, language, nature,
Form: Rhyme
I love; I really love your voice and your diction
Recite me a poem in an unknown language
I don't give a darn about the pronunciation
Undress the words; I love them when they're naked.
Take your time; be loud, louder, harder, and then softer
Do not stop when you arrive at the top of the valleys
Increase the volume, drive me crazy and make gestures
I love the tone but I don't understand the vocabular.
Recite the poem in a language that I do not know
Bring controversial words into my brain, in my core
Force me to inhale the rhythm to the point of dying
I'm inebriated. The sly lyrics are tattooed on my skin.
It's okay to charm me, and to caress me with the words
Again and again. Read proficiently like a veteran actress
I'm heading to bed right now, to lay on my back unstressed
So I can dream like a genius in agony on the old docks.
Copyright © November 2018, Hébert Logerie, All rights reserved.
Hébert Logerie is the author of several books of poetry.
This is a translation of the poem 'Récite-Moi Un Poème Dans Une Langue Inconnue' by Hebert Logerie.
Categories:
langue, bible, creation, culture, language,
Form: Rhyme
Dans une langue qui ne m'appartient pas
j'essaie d'y mettre la lune entière
son sourire à plein dents et sa lumière douce
les mots me semblent creux et pourtant
en chacun d'eux, une étoile filante
mes espoirs, tous gris, tracés, brulants
quittant ce corps courbaturé
un rêve s'échappe coincé
cherchant
un oreiller où se poser
celui de ton regard qui ne m'a jamais quitté
comment le retrouver
sans devoir fermer mes paupières
--TRANSLATION--
In a language that doesn't belong to me
I am trying to place the moon
It's full toothed smile and it's soft light
The words seem hollow and yet
in each of them is a shooting star
my hopes, all in grey, traced, burning
leaving this sore body
a dream escapes stuck
searching
for a pillow to rest upon
the one that is your gaze that never left me
How to find it again
without having to close my eyes?
Categories:
langue, i miss you, imagery,
Form: Free verse
Take off your pants
This is no romance.
It’s a stick up.
As Woodie said
They can rob you with a fountain pen
But I don’t your money
And I don’t take prisoners.
What I want to take from you
Is your turn to talk.
You see
This gun which I use in my trade
Is always pressed against my brain.
Its fatal touch
Doesn’t come with bullets
But with my words
That always it their mark
But drift into a deaf wind.
If all my friends learn to listen they’d
Hear
"Je suis avec les paysans car je suis l'un d'entre eux.
Et laisser ma langue devenir une guillotine
Donc je peux couper à travers les absurdités
De tous les courtiers immobiliers
Dont les lignes viennent comme théâtre bon marché.
I want you to
Bury my heart on the Upper West Side.
I want the beat
to
Sing the SRO tenants’
War song.
To drive all landlords back across the Hudson or the L.I.E
And ebb the flow of
Those who are just visiting
And who speak the tongue of their nameless towns."
Categories:
langue, conflict, political,
Form: Narrative
La plus belle femme dans la monde,
je la vois toujours.
Parfois, elle me voit. Parfois, elle ne fait pas.
Que doit-on faire? Que doit-on dire?
La réponse me échappe.
Est le langue de l'amour le même partout?
Dit-moi la vérité.
La plus belle femme dans la monde,
je suis manquer de temps pour la dire.
Tout ce que je tente échoue.
Les portes sont ferment.
J'espère que je reçois le courage pour la dire,
elle est toute ce que j'ai jamais voulu.
L'AMOUR est tout ce que j'ai jamais voulu.
Categories:
langue, beautiful, french, girl,
Form: Free verse
The door; this door in front of my tired eyes,
How still my weary lies—encumbered pace;
Does longing vindicate my weary cries,
Or does one need to trace my engraved face?
While birds of sylvan shades have flown aside,
As flames engulfed the land: a swift-paced tongue.
The pain has spread across my cage; beside
The unchained spur of fear—possessed no langue.
Where will they go? where smiles are carved atop
The clouds, the woods, a tavern—Endless stock
Of forlorn hopes that try to fly but flop,
Towards the fair of bad dreams where they flock:
To buy their long-lost stock of freedom high;
My cage dissolved, at last I too can fly.
Categories:
langue, deep, freedom,
Form: Sonnet
never did like the southern accent,
no matter how gorgeous the lady was
whose mouth it was coming out of---
always had a preference for the
NYC toughness or the sophisticated-
car-commercial-intense
langue des Londoniens
&
to be truthful, it wasn’t the accent
but the christ that bubbled out from the
mouths of every individual he
encountered whilst sweltering in
the haze of Tennessee or
the stale hot of Texas &
yet, in retrospect,
he wondered if the drawl was something
that might be spiced up with a bit of
Atheism---
that is to say that if a bodacious GRITS, a
statuesque sweet potato queen,
was sitting in a café or perhaps
standing next to a pool table in
the local dive &
rather than quoting scripture or
babbling about the baby jesus,
asking what church one belonged to
or fondling the 18 karat crucifix
tied round her neck (how young sexy
christian thangs flirt)
when come upon by a strapping
young interested lad,
she changed things up a bit
by saying “yew know, gawd is dead.”---
this would be a wondrous occasion.
Categories:
langue, life, , atheist,
Form: Free verse
Your love song lapsed into ancient French that April day.
I only understood the words of spring and heartsore
lapsed. Only love and heartsore, I understood your ancient
words of the spring-day song into that French April.
You fabricate my pauses into repetition, silence speaks
of ages strung to rhyme in love’s difficult service
you strung into pauses in service to ages. Fabricate of
love’s repetition, rhyme speaks my difficult silence.
We practice tedium of vows till language breaks apart.
As if art should aim at science, rigorous, quantitative,
rigorous language breaks tedium. Science vows a part of
quantitative practice till we should aim “as if” at art.
Till we lapsed into language. As your ancient ages only
fabricate quantitative French strung to that difficult
practice, science speaks of tedium and understood rhyme.
The spring in service of love’s rigorous vows. April
pauses, heartsore. You and I, apart. If love should aim
my words at day, repetition breaks into silence of song.
Categories:
langue, loss, love, music, words,
Form: Verse