Yesterday pastel pinkColored my dreams againEverything clouded with youThe huge gladiolusRoaring on its spursTwenty busts of dead womenWith heavy tonguesAnd stagnant breathOppressive venison of dawnPressed their pale lipsOn the ghostly necklineOf your nameYesterday the velvet was greenUnder the bridgesThe taste of old treesObsesses meThe sea whistles on the beaten groundI am afraid of being aloneBlood and vomit of real lifeI will build sexes in secretHereditary nightmaresDusty autumn flowersI’m afraid of being alone in the grave——————————————Bronze comme la nuit tombéeHier le rose pastelColorait mes rêves encoreTout embués de vousLe grand glaïeulBramait sur ses ergotsVingt bustes de mortesAux langues lourdesEt haleine stagnatOpprimante venaison de l’aubePressaient leurs lèvres blèmesSur l’encolure fantomaleDe ton nomHier le velours verdoyaitSous les pontsLe goût des vieux arbresM’obsèdeLa mer siffle sur le sol battuJ’ai peur d’être seuleSang et vommisure de la vie réelleJe construirai des sexes à secretDes cauchemars héréditairesPoussiéreuses fleurs d’automneJ’ai peur d’être seule dans la tombe
Bronze Like Nightfall
Feature Date
- April 28, 2024
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- Translation
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“Bronze Like Nightfall” from IN THE GLITTERING MAW: SELECTED POEMS: by Joyce Mansour.
Published by World Poetry on May 21, 2024.
English Copyright © by C. Francis Fisher.
All rights reserved.
Reproduced by Poetry Daily with permission.
One of the most important female Surrealist writers, Joyce Mansour (1928–1986) was born in England to Syrian-Jewish parents. Soon after her birth, the family moved to Cairo, where Mansour lived until she was forced to emigrate. She settled in Paris in 1953, where she continued writing and became a key member of the postwar Surrealist milieu. Mansour published sixteen books of poetry in her lifetime as well as prose and theater pieces. She died of cancer in Paris in 1986.
C. Francis Fisher received her MFA in poetry from Columbia University. Her work has appeared in The Brooklyn Rail, The Yale Review, and The Los Angeles Review of Books, among others. Her poem, “Self-Portrait at 25” was selected for the 2021 Academy of American Poets Prize and “Hotel in Sfakia” was a finalist for the 2024 James Hearst Poetry Prize. She has been supported by fellowships from Brooklyn Poets and the Vermont Studio Center. Her manuscript, Both Horse and Jockey was a finalist for the Lexi Rudnitsky Prize with Persea Books in 2023. Her first book of translations, In the Glittering Maw: Selected Poems of Joyce Mansour, will appear with World Poetry May ’24.
New York City, New York
"C. Francis Fisher’s translations of Joyce Mansour’s later poems give fresh voice to a fierce, passionate, sensuous, scandalous cry that has strained to be heard in the Anglophone world for over half a century. It’s about time."
— Mark Polizzotti
“Guillaume Apollinaire, Nelly Sachs, Frank O’Hara—how strange to find the magnificent Joyce Mansour, in C. Francis Fisher’s sinewy and imaginative translation, summoning that trio of revolutionary voices! Most of my life has been spent in ignorance of Mansour’s eccentric and eruptive genius. Thanks to this indispensable new translation, I can make amends, and hug close to me this most corporeal and threshold-traversing poet, who seems, like Louise Bourgeois, to be the apostle of fleshly metamorphosis. Torn between difficulty and joy, Mansour makes new—and blissfully out-of-bounds—limbs and organs emerge in every line, like a shower of comets.”
— Wayne Koestenbaum
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