Poems by ​Deborah Heissler

The amorous body                                                                  lies on the bed
 
And if suddenly all was engulfed by the serene avidity of this world’s end, and I would never have to depart again, like someone who leaves a city and reaches the nearby forests. It would be like entering into this space, similar to a house, in which possibility could be imminent, and something could be ready to open and brighten up.
 
It just rained in torrents for a few minutes. The birds, previously colourless, now even seem to fly without shape. What happens next almost totally eludes me.
 
Then I resume walking and take in the trees in my sight. I remember. Since the morning of the second day I cherish the endless sound of your steps in the bedroom.
 
And soon came those late-afternoon shivers, followed by the golden light and the sinking shadows of the evening, each one hovering low on the horizon.
 
You watch, you inhale the smell of earth. The sky is clear, the clouds nearly white in the intense heat of August. All the apple trees stand there, their crowns slightly larger, and it is as if a little part of night is flowing inside the night, and a multitude of tiny flowers are opening in the dark, exuding the scent of seed and rose, like a swatch of night cut out of its own cloth.



Like a swatch of night cut out of its own cloth.
Translated into English by Sabine Huynh
Comme un morceau de nuit, découpé dans son étoffe © Editions Cheyne, 2010, p. 16-18.




Birds, snow and fruit
that the eye leads
itself, from one time to another
outside, largely

We’ve hit on something

The earth as a blank
has hit on something
so cold

that all the year to the heart
is touched





and that kind also of open flower
wide open
from the heart

as if behind its first words
a stranger’s figure
an exile perhaps

ungraspable
or perhaps only ungrasped

traveled along the horizon
pensively, touched

on objects forgotten
in the painter’s canvas





— the gesture of his shoulder, nude
and as though surprised
dense and open
infinitely real

and yet open to the unreal

like a gaze that wanders
on the water’s surface


A few simple figures
English translation © Jacob Bromberg

​

Heissler (c) Alexandre Gefen

Deborah Heissler (born 5 May 1976 in Mulhouse, France) is a contemporary French author published by Cheyne (since 2005) and Æncrages & Co (since 2013). Her works of poetry have garnered critical acclaim and numerous awards, including the Louis Guillaume Prose Poetry Award (2012), the Yvan Goll International Prize for French Poetry (2011) and the Bleustein-Blanchet Foundation Prize (2005).

From 1980 to 1998, training on the piano. In 1988 she won a writing scholarship Antoinette and Pol Neveux of the French Academy. From 1994 to 2008, she devoted herself to the study of Contemporary Literature and was graduated of the University of Haute Alsace in Culture and Information Science (2008) in Mulhouse (France). She held a PhD in French Literature (2005), joined the Center for European Literary Studies at the University of Haute Alsace (2001–2008) and at the same time published her first collection of poems awarded by the Bleustein-Blanchet Foundation Prize for the Vocation: Près d'eux, la nuit sous la neige, Cheyne publisher, (2005).
Then she became visiting Student at the Library-Museum of the Paris Opera in 2007, conducted research work on Roger Pic's Paris Opera Ballet photographs dedicated to dance in the 1960s and there discovered Jiří Kylián, Pina Bausch, Angelin Preljocaj, William Christie and Nicolas Le Riche. She then left the National Library of France for India, China, Thailand and finally Vietnam where she taught French as a Foreign Language in several Universities and French Language Departments. Her stay at the University of Xiangtan in Hunan (China) provided her many photographs and poems. Like a swatch of night cut out of its own cloth, Cheyne publisher, 2010 –partly written in Hunan, China– was recognized by the Yvan Goll International Prize for French Poetry in 2011 as well as the Louis Guillaume Prose Poetry award in 2012.
She became member of the Louis Guillaume Prose Poetry Award in 2015.

​Her Works include:
​Sorrowful Songs, with artwork by Peter Maslow, preface by Claude Chambard, Æncrages & Co publisher, 2015
Kanten, with artwork by Michel Remaud,  2015
A la lisière des champs, [L3V], with artwork by Michel Remaud, 2015
Chiaroscuro, with artwork by André Jolivet, Æncrages & Co publisher, 2013
Viennent / en silence, with artwork by André Jolivet, Voltije publisher, 2012
Comme un morceau de nuit, découpé dans son étoffe (Like a swatch of night cut out of its own cloth), preface by Dominique Sorrente, Cheyne publisher, 2010
Près d'eux, la nuit sous la neige, Cheyne publisher, 2005

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