from The Next Loves

from The Next Loves: I

His look and it took maybe 3
hello / seconds
only      his head underneath the blue hoodie
he takes off
because the rain is stopping      look here’s
the planner’s confirmation and
someone’s holding an imaginary map of the conversation we’ll say
that and that
the streets will be all orderly
if I stay close inside
the zones he surveys
but it isn’t easy
imagining that the table and the lamp and the evening
sound like his breathlessness when he uncovers me and cleans


from The Next Loves: V

Red t-shirt and husky voice
we do yoga together      much less strong
than I am but so much more beautiful
at the end in savasana when we’re supposed to become
one of those vibrations in the air and the ritual bell
sets us
almost behind absence I can only
think like an animal to live oh oh
oh that long slim desire
stretched out 2 meters away if I
rolled over on him really would that from now on be the only 
hope of slowing
because of the sweetness in your bones
the quickness of death against which I recite a rose 
     is a rose is a rose is a rose


from The Next Loves: X

And then afterwards we left
together & by car he drives
the icy sun strikes villages painted blue-gray 
     impossible to park anywhere safe
for four nights running we can’t just
leave it / hop on the train he loves      the highway
is empty the gps in charge of the way we talk about
the climate conference Cancun
yadda yadda it all sounds like his voice
and here’s the unexpected story 
     once upon a time 1 & 1
are given a some time together the same air
carried within a little metal shell itself as fragile
and itself as easy to crush


from The Next Loves: XIII

In the film Casey
Affleck knocks out his girlfriends with his fists
& kills them      I’m sitting
next to Kenneth
but it’s no good jumping on him he’ll just
squirm out with a smile      in the film
we’re told that a house is
peaceful if the chairs
are pulled up around the table &
the eggs are sizzling in the skillet & there’s someone
we draw closer like trusting little rabbits
and he kills us and the house was quiet
and the world
was calm


Translated from the French by Lindsay Turner.



Poems originally appeared in Oversound. Reprinted with the permission of the translator.