Translated from Portuguese by Dan Hanrahan I know you by your scent, by your clothes, by your cars, by your rings and, of course, by your love of money. By your love of money that some distant ancestor left you as inheritance. I know you by your scent. I know you by your scent and by the dollar signs that embellish your eyes that hardly blink for your love of money. For your love of money and all that negates life: the asylum, the cell, the border. I know you by your scent. I know you by the scent of pestilence and horror that spreads wherever you go —I know you by your love of money. Under your love of money, God is a father so cheap he charges for his miracles. I know you by your scent. I know you by the scent, of sulfur, which you can’t mask which clings to all that you touch for the love of money. For your love of money, you respond with loathing to a smile, to pleasure, to poetry. I know you by your scent. I know you by your scent. Smell one of you and I’ve smelled all of you who survive only by your love of money. For the love of money, you turn even your own daughters to hard currency, to pure gold. I know you by your scent. I know you by your scent. I know you by the stench of your rotting corpse that somehow walks for its love of money.
Originally published in the December 2018 issue of Words Without Borders. © Ricardo Aleixo. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2018 by Dan Hanrahan. All rights reserved.
Translated from Portuguese by Dan Hanrahan
I am whatever you think a black man is. You almost never think about black men. I will always be what you want a black man to be. I am your black man. I’ll never be only your black man. I am my black man before I am yours. Your black man. A black man is always somebody’s black man. Or they are not a black man at all, but a man. Just a man. When they say that a man is black, what they mean is that he is more black than he is man. But all the same, I’m a black man to you. I’m what you imagine black men to be. I can spill onto your whiteness the blackness that defines a black man in the eyes of someone who is not black. The black man is the invention of the white man. It is believed that to the white man falls the burden of creating all that is good in the world, and that I am good, and that I was created by whites. That they fear me more than they fear other white people. That they fear me, but at the same time desire my forbidden body. That they would scalp me for the doomed love they bear for my blackness. I was not born black. I’m not black every moment of the day. I am black only when they want me to be black. Those times that I am not just black, I am as adrift as the most lost white person. I am not just what you think I am.
Originally published in the December 2018 issue of Words Without Borders. © Ricardo Aleixo. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2018 by Dan Hanrahan. All rights reserved.
Translated from Portuguese by Dan Hanrahan I died how many times in the longest night? In the motionless night, heavy and long, I died how many times on the night of calunga? The night does not end and here I am dying again nameless and again dying with each hole opened in the musculature of the person I once was. I died how many times in the bleeding bruised night? In the night of calunga so long and so heavy, I died how many times on that terrible night? The night most death and there I was dying again voiceless and again dying with each bullet lodged in the deepest depths of what I remain (and with each silence of stone and mortar that sheds the white of your indifference onto the shadow of what I no longer am and never will be again). I died how many times in the night of calunga? In the brackish night, night without end, the oceanic night, all emptied of blood, I died how many times in the terrible night the night of calunga in the Bairro Cabula? I’ve died so many times but they never kill me once and for all. My blood is a seed that the wind roots in the belly of the earth and I am born again and again and my name is that which does not die before making the night no longer the silent partner of death but the mother that births children the color of night and watches over them as a panther who shows, in the light of her gaze and in the sharpness of her teeth, just what she will do if the hand of evil even imagines troubling the sleep of her cub. I’ve died so many times but I am always reborn stronger brave and beautiful— all I know is to be. I am many, I extend across the world and across time inside me and I am so many one day I will make life live.
Originally published in the December 2018 issue of Words Without Borders. © Ricardo Aleixo. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2018 by Dan Hanrahan. All rights reserved.
Translated from French by Marilyn Hacker
Pour Ali la Pointe
Here where each day calls out to our suffering
Here where each step chains our desire for hope
Here where everything cries out misfortune violence famine
Here where blood is confirmed silently and grief gains ground
He died. Died buried under a pile of rubble
While he trampled hatred down with his proud blood
So that the roots of his impatient people
Would grow knotty in the shadow of the flag
Gray tears, so slow to cool
Endurances curved round the sacred fire
Because they wanted to condemn our long
Arid thankless processions to the shadows
Because they wanted to tear up our lives
At the borders of oblivion
Ali La Pointe, son of a land that took up arms
Sole penance, disturbing spacious nights
Who wrestled down infamy, devoured disdain
At first sight of their guns
Here he is indicting at one more meeting
Their blood-gorged breath; he is there
For those who know the universe at the dark hour
Of Servitudes
Furies of one shared past!
His face—mirror of cruelties—where a chorus of cries
Fuses our hope, sharpens our freedom
Here he is again, living hostage in the wrinkles around
Our eyes where the new sun has driven away
Shame and emptiness forever. I say: spotted, wrinkled, polished fruits.
We sow because death is determined
Because death is stronger than hunger
O mother country, he called you Certainty before his rapture
Then gave himself to the flames to restore
Your sovereign brightness.
Yesterday strapped down once more by insults of the lords and masters
Swallowed up by incest misery
He loved the humble, set tenderness free
Devoured the past
At the multiple hour of inheritance
When our joy tells the beads of present freedoms
When his name is whispered in our silences
I cry out: Child of the Casbah
Spring thaw on the ramparts
Originally published in the January 2019 issue of Words Without Borders. © Djamal Amrani. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2019 by Marilyn Hacker. All rights reserved.
Translated from French by Marilyn Hacker X Who will tell the sun about my land my harried medlar tree my springtime without nervures my helpful hand Who will recount my rootless garden and my door open to all comers my night of faraway sounds my wheat that absorbs the hours Who will cure me of my sequestration and sweet secret —my monochrome dream my space gone gray at the temples the barter of my frenzy the slumber at the edge of my well of fever My steppe with an abundance of laughter Perhaps it would be enough . . . But I watch time passing
Originally published in the January 2019 issue of Words Without Borders. © Djamal Amrani. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2019 by Marilyn Hacker. All rights reserved.
Translated from French by Marilyn Hacker The outflow of your drifting— up until now you’ve slid along the road I would like in a faraway language to tell you what I don’t understand ** Nothing pulls you back from doubt any longer from obsession from seeding your body is amnesia plural futile limpid a disappearance stands in for space stands in for an emptiness to circle round ** Not visible the sense slumbers teeters on the edge you expect nothing of the hours not the days returned not daybreak you expect ** There had been no days without sand and you thought the sun inexhaustible you had not seen: the lantern is cold ** Leaving you clamber up your confusion on the cord of forgetting Leaving is all of life still behind you ** What remains to begin each morning at the same hour like starting from zero to answer time’s memory loss and the drift of ages your mother, trembling the genealogy of the worst the disaster of the gods to finish counting the remaining hours ** You can’t bring yourself to let go of the sky’s edge at nine o’clock this morning you hold the sailboat’s breath head for the narrowest path to redraw the mirage ** You ask yourself what is a place of your own if you must fade yourself out unweight yourself of promises yesterday you wanted to know if and now you no longer know why you should have dived in with no expectations
Originally published in the January 2019 issue of Words Without Borders. © Samira Negrouche. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2019 by Marilyn Hacker. All rights reserved.
Translated from Portuguese by John Keene
I am a black renegade
I refuse the mirror daily
Which tries to massacre me inside
Which tries to deceive me with white lies
Which tries to discolor me with its rays of light
I am a black renegade
Determined to face the system
I drum up the black without a hitch
I bum-rush the stage
I am a black renegade
I advocate a necessary darkening
I unmask any racists in the closet
I shove my foot in the door and walk in
Originally published in the December 2018 issue of Words Without Borders. © Cristiane Sobral. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2018 by John Keene. All rights reserved.
Translated from Portuguese by John Keene I won’t wash the dishes anymore Or dust the furniture I’m sorry I’ve begun to read The other day I opened a book and a week later I decided I won’t carry the trash out to the trash bin Or clean up the mess of leaves falling in the yard I’m sorry After reading I noticed each dish has its own aesthetic, an aesthetic of traces, of ethics, of static I look at my hands as they flip the books’ pages Hands much softer than they were before I feel that I can start to be all the time I feel. If something happens I am not going to wash anymore. Nor bring your rugs in for dry cleaning My eyes grow teary I’m sorry Now that I’ve begun to read I want to understand, why, why? And why things exist I read and I read and I read I even smiled And left the beans to burn. . . See, the beans always take time to cook Let’s just say things are different now. . . . Ah, I forgot to say I won’t do it any more I‘ve resolved to have some time for myself I’ve resolved to read about what's going on between us Don’t wait for me Don’t call for me I won’t be going From everything I’ve ever read, from everything I understand It was you who went Went too far, for too long, past the alphabet It had to be spelled out for you I won’t wash things to cover up the true filth Or dust things clean and scatter the dust from here to there and from there to here I’ll disinfect my hands and avoid your moving parts I won’t touch alcohol After so many years literate I’ve learned to read After so much time together I’ve learned to make a break My sneaker from your shoe My drawer from your ties My perfume from your scent My canvas from your frame That’s how it is, I’m not washing a thing anymore And I stare at the filth at the bottom of the glass The moment always arrives of shaking things up, of moving forward, of making sense of things I do not wash dishes anymore I read the signature on my Emancipation Proclamation in black capital letters, size 18, double-spaced I set myself free I do not wash dishes anymore I want silver platters Deluxe kitchens And gold jewelry The real kind So is the Emancipation Proclamation decreed
Originally published in the December 2018 issue of Words Without Borders. © Cristiane Sobral. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2018 by John Keene. All rights reserved.
Translated from Portuguese by John Keene Time is an essence I carry within me Time and its strands They've been coiled inside me since my navel was knotted It has as its complementary counterpart The space between time and its options Time, lord of the hours reigns sovereign Subtly, on a silver cord People don't kill time He is the killer.
Originally published in the December 2018 issue of Words Without Borders. © Cristiane Sobral. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2018 by John Keene. All rights reserved.
Translated from French by Marilyn Hacker For Eliane, Mireille, and Regina We dreamed of a phlegmatic life for you of sleep and siestas sweet things, an honorable luxury a carpet of rich flowers at your feet to put your fears to sleep —Malek Alloula, The Exercise of the Senses Death’s dust has disrobed you even of your soul —Pierre Jean Jouve, Matière céleste A Algeria whose whiteness flowed into lead A black decade / years of blood Rupture Algeria, la Maison Blanche Austere welcome of the patriarch in his tight-fitting borrowed suit who knew the rites of passage the institution’s stringent checks Arrivals and departures both distressing S Songbirds, the innocent larks at the border of Saint-Cloud So many memories Eliane told me Simple choices solid ties Impatience to know the city’s every corner Thirsty beneath the blinking neon But you always did your homework S Slip from the frame to shape the film A new world opening in the red Salutary progression where you speak and Give voice to peasant women joyously Telling their stories A thirst to speak You burst through the screen I Impatient red desire the dazzling meeting Passage Camels Impatient to live A All that black: no sooner liberated Medina’s women excluded from the procession Disinherited Denial of the Messenger’s daughter Rue Eugène Vartan How vast the prison The world is not a film set D Disillusion, pain, on the horizon’s eighty degrees Disappearance of the French language Debacle, that will not let you rest until you Drift where the word carries you J Joyous days standing to sing the country Algeria the Fortunate setting itself free Erasure of all trace Of ancient Caesarea the smell of the sea without armor And mute absinthe E Emerald at the foot of the lions’ mountain Oran scoffs at the chiaroscuro of a gaze To each his own shamelessness Another Rimitti makes amends The minotaur basks in the sun on the Cintra’s terrace B Brawling and fantasia keep a memory alive You transcribe its austere narrative From rags of the massacre Weave the story’s brightness A Abdelkader roars on the Place d’Armes The theater is open White with all those dead calling us to order The kingdom of shadows has no taste R Rest you too Return in peace, O soul The father’s house is a living language Open to guests passing through
Originally published in the January 2019 issue of Words Without Borders. © Habib Tengour. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2019 by Marilyn Hacker. All rights reserved.
Translated from French by Marilyn Hacker This particular Tartar doesn’t have four dromedaries for traveling That’s what he usually says Not without a touch of irony —it’s annoying to repeat yourself Justify your immobility Give all sorts of explanations No one asks for them Isn’t it the survival of some sort of atavism? Nomadism is an art a camel is indispensable ** The Tartars know something about it What they recount was classed as a world heritage But they’re not the only ones to have Made use of a scholarly poetry on the question And oases for thirst as the saying goes Property of the picturesque nomad The affirmation is categorical Scathing cutting all discussion short ** This particular Tartar doesn’t leave that is to say never leaves the enclosure of the Kremlin High walls pulled down now since June Trenches filled in gigantic peripheral highways Places for not-so-weekly markets Not very talented maybe a mask Strategy of representation Poison of urban phantasmagoria A character wrung out like a dishrag It’s not amusing Not dramatic either He daydreams in his garret of unveiling the mysteries of magnificent cities Illumination ** The briefest departure as soon as it’s imagined Which is rare turns out to be a Chinese puzzle He’s got to think about it at length very lengthily indeed To mope to dissect to gnaw away at it to howl at the crows In order to rouse himself How do you decide to leave? It’s complicated it requires loads of energy Contrary to preconceived ideas Or received ones That cast shadows on the wall behind the dump ** He’s constantly preparing detailed itineraries Drawn down to the millimeter With a Prussian staff officer’s precision For minutiae he has a compass in his eye Despite his genetic stain He works on it nonstop for weeks Suddenly just like that presto subito Realizes that he doesn’t have the means to do this or Another extravagant destination occurs to him And then what good is it all? Finished! Trashcan! What a pity ** Going down the road to bargain-hunt at the Villejuif fleamarket or have a look At the Canon at Gobelins that’s an expedition Adventure! A real one there where they shiver in bomb-craters The famous voyages of Sindbad the Sailor on the Indian Ocean or the Coral Sea, that he devours greedily in the Galland translation (especially the prints that he acquired under the counter) are no great thing. Ordinary Sunday strolls, rubbish, compared to the slightest displacement he’s obliged to make out of his village. That’s something serious! Like hearing the moans at dawn fifty leagues off, of Behemoths in heat Nothing to do with meaningless roadside rustlings ** It’s not that he’s cowardly like those Uighurs of the second Or even the third generation and after Those arrogant bastards don’t ever dare decamp from their seedy ghetto Where they terrorize old ladies on the staircase landing! Troublesome delinquents! Drug dealers! Part-time swindlers and pyromaniacs! And you, mate, you don’t like the Uighurs much No one can stand the Uighurs! It’s an open wound ** Not a loafer like those Merovingian kings Who, the new schoolbooks affirm, Would travel sluggishly supine in ox-carts Ambulant jellies obstructing the roadways The palace mayors fortunately they were around Put up with the job No, certainly not He wasn’t indecisive either Don’t trust appearances ** The Tartars obstinate enterprising people Who don’t give in easily Calloused hands agile minds in an era where Ploughs / feathers don’t mean a thing Defying maledictions all day long and daily Demoralized and downcast for ages Accursed crow so white and beautiful O God Turned swarthy for having disobeyed deliberately or Just mistaken a bag of lice for a bag of gold A regrettable incident it only happens to people like us Or we would have ended up like this But we ended up like this In the same satchel as the Uighurs ** But none of this concerns him His almost-official lodging on the outskirts of Bicêtre A small government flat as he’s a veteran Taught him While forgetting proverbs the steel of the tribe To temper his nomad ancestry To park his suitcases on the parquet A dream the soldier cherishes while marching Easier to say than to do but it’s done An unchanging existence doesn’t kill you really You taste things differently diminishing like soap ** To draw a line through his past —he’d like to write his memoirs One foot in the grave The hope of a conversation with himself Getting rid of his illusions Finding the words to say who he is It brings a kind of lightness No moodiness or extravagance He’d been able to attempt the impossible Win that great victory ** Into the closet with his bellicose instincts his morbid frenzy his unsatisfied sexual appetites his trashy primitive nostalgia to peacefully cultivate a sparse rocky patch of land (above all prefers pampering a tomato plant he brought back from Toulon with lettuces sorrel and wild thyme) won without cheating memorable Tarot reading they still talk about it today profusion of savory details witticisms you had to admire that card game at the Café de la Mairie ** This particular Tartar is unbeatable at cards Except for whist (not a game for Tartars) Which permits him to make ends meet Sometimes throw a party, a feast Where all the neighborhood enjoys his largesse Well-planned banquets, a sophisticated mise en scène Remembered for a certain decorum Generosity in the blood secular recommendations What he says so as not to be labeled a brainless spender And maybe he believes it Everyone’s there to receive the manna Celebrate the donor Shouting his slogan: I sow gold . . . We’re not likely to see such days again soon ** There’s always a glistening pigeon favorable circumstances Newly arrived in the neighborhood the bird lets himself be plucked without a fuss Satisfied, even The game takes place according to the rules A good-natured politeness Nothing to be said No regrets no unseemly protests Everyone sympathizes / calm / the sucker holds the spittoon while they tot up the score In such a situation you can lose with style Not lose face
Originally published in the January 2019 issue of Words Without Borders. © Habib Tengour. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2019 by Marilyn Hacker. All rights reserved.