Miettes 2015
Devise pour une cave
‘Noyez mon ãme aux flots de votre Vin’
Verlaine (Sagesse 2).
Bottle Motto
Drown my soul in the waves of your wine.
Avalanche
Le paradis blanc est sur une piste noire.
The heavenly slope is blackened.
A Step into the Dark
La vie est une rệve d’avenir. Je me sauve.
Life is a dream of the future. I’m off.
Antonin Artaud, Poet of Madness
Ma dẻraison lucide ne redoute pas le chaos.
My lucid unreason fears not chaos.
Napoleon
‘C’est avec les hochets qu’on mẻne les hommes’
It is with rattles that one leads men.
I wonder did he mean death-rattles?
Je me demande s’il veut dire les 'rattles' de la mort ?
Miss Roussillon
‘Je suis trės motivėe et attacheė ả dėfendre le Roussillon de tout mon corps.’
Mon mėtier
Je gribouille mes inepties
I scribble my ineptitudes.
Schema pour un Shocker
Une maison close ce que stockệ par les putes qui restent vierges
A brothel stocked with working women who remain virgins.
Divenette sans rėsolution
La lutte politique est entre ceux qui entendent s’adapter au monde et ceux qui desirent change le monde. Mais le bas blesse est le monde change tout seul.
The political struggle is between those who adapt to the world and those who want to change it. But the catch is the world changes itself.
Le nageur mauviette d’Irelande
Il nage dans la pluie, pas dans la neige.
Sur le Tard 1
C’est la vie en (l’arth)rose.
No translation possible.
2. English
Grief
The most common response in France is ‘Je ne sais pas’, followed by the irritating ‘peut-ėtre’, and compounded by the patronising ‘pas grave’.
Eavesdrop: divine le sujet?
‘And he never came back to deliver’
Snap Judgment
If you don’t take Wallace Stevens too seriously,
he is the best American poet of the 20th century.
La vie par Ronan O’Gara
‘If everybody cheats you get away with it. If you’re the only one that cheats you don’t’.
Coquille Exprės
For JRR Tolkien read Alice B Toklas
Mimesis
Derives from mimosa whose flowers when approached by a fly ‘mimic the grimaces of mummers’ (Aristotle)
Bonne Nouvelle
Nothing continues to happen.
Credo
The purpose of writing is not merely to be read. Darkening the page is good for the soul.
Kill Joy
More amused than one lets on.
Same Difference
An Englishman in the wrong attacks, an Irishman laughs. When they are in the right, it’s the other way around.
Yours sincerely
When you hear someone talking about the need for sincerity, you know you’re dealing with a deeply dishonest person.
Rupture
Friendship reduced to politeness.
Sleep
is good if you wake up.
Christy Ring’s Word Sonnet
Never take your eye off the ball, even when it’s in the referee’s pocket.
Sink
Mankind is secure in the plug that it’s going down.
Bisbille
Don’t shout. You’re not speaking to a mobile phone.
Devise de gendarmes
The criminal is alright right.
Sagesse Francåis
The wisest answer to a question is to ask another one.
Voltaire
Those who aren’t up to ideas, despise them.
Knowledge
Cynicism based on ignorance is a violence
The History of Ideas
Information is water under the bridge. The truth is honey. It sticks.
Jamais trop tard
Michel Montaigne owned extensive vineyards, and wondered as he lay dying what fermentation meant.
Partial Eclipse
Sunlight seen between clouds
Cervantes Remains
A skull, a scapula, a hard hat (should one mention Don Quixote?)
Caution
Never have a political argument with some one younger than yourself.
In all likelihood they know something you don’t.
Sur Le Tard 2
The degradation of my lamentable orthography has augmented insidiously in my declining decennium
Random Killers
I can’t understand how anyone could kill someone they don’t know.
Crise politique
When you lose what you expect you also lose your sense of justice.
Magic Trick
Superstition clings to coincidences.
My mind is a fiction of ideas
Nothing is unthinkable, but some things don’t happen.
Shock
You can’t fully realise what you’ve said or done until you see it reflected in another’s face.
For those who would live for ever
Gin and tonic has been replaced by gym and tonic water.
Happy Valley
Retiring to their dream house in the country they spend their latter years worrying about septic tanks.
On Balance
It isn’t that people are stupid, it’s only that they don’t think.
A Reason for Optimism
When I open my mouth the look of fear tells people want to understand me.
Black Lie
You’ve been always white with me.
Indifference
Why should people be interested in anything out of the ordinary.
Living in the present is a luxury.
I’m to busy catching up.
Malbouffe Lemmings
People consume food and drink as though their death depended on it.
Pompette
I drink brandy to keep my spirits up.
Funerals
On the tedious side of embarrassing.
Backstage
Dying is the performance. Living is the rehearsal.
Lonely
I wouldn’t mind being alone if I wasn’t without you.