In Translation: The Dancer Introduces One of His Aspects

The French poet Edouard Dupas recently completed his translation of my poem, The Dancer Introduces One of His Aspects at : http://poesie-et-racbouni.over-blog.com/article-bryan-thao-worra-le-danseur-presente-l-un-de-ses-aspects-102442261.html

The original appeared in English in my book BARROW in 2009, but had originally been written and revised periodically in the early 1990s:

The Dancer Introduces One of His Aspects 

I am Shiva, I am Kali,
I am the bird you never see.

With riddles infested full of dreams,
I am the corpse that pollutes the stream.

I am the angel, soot-eyed with breath of pitch.
I am your hound, found by the ditch.

I am the bait of a child, hanging in the glooms.
I am the memory of She, interred in the tomb.

My hands are the coiling tendrils of a drying jade vine,
My feet are the fires doused by the vagrant’s wine.

My heart is the wheel, breaking the road.
My kiss and my spit, the gifts of my lips, the precious abode.

My ribs are the spars from which flowers grow,
My bones are the tethers the sages know.

My eyes are the conquerors who ride through the night,
My howl, the laughter of children born anew out of sight

Plunged down as a pavement for my eternal act.
You try to flee?

I am the dancer, I am the city.


My sincere thanks to Monsieur Dupas, and I look forward to seeing additional translations by him of mine and other  poets' work.