The Ardennes Forest

Cup your hands to scoop up sleep

as you would draw a grain of water

and the forest will come: a green cloud

a birch trunk like a chord of light

and a thousand eyelids fluttering

with forgotten leafy speech

then you will recall the white morning

when you waited for the opening of the gates

you know this land is opened by a bird

that sleeps in a tree and the tree in the earth

but here is a spring of new questions

underfoot the currents of bad roots

look at the pattern on the bark where

a chord of music tightens

the lute player who presses the frets

so the silent resounds

push away leaves: a wild strawberry

dew on a leaf the comb of grass

further a wing of a yellow damselfly

and an ant burying its sister

a wild pear sweetly ripens

above the treacheries of belladonnas

without waiting for greater rewards

sit under the tree

cup your hands to draw up memory

of the dead names dried grain

again the forest: a charred cloud

forehead branded by black light

and a thousand lids pressed

tightly on motionless eyeballs

a tree and the air broken

betrayed faith of empty shelters

that other forest is for us is for you

the dead also ask for fairy tales

for a handful of herbs water of memories

therefore by needles by rustling

and faint threads of fragrances—

no matter that a branch stops you

a shadow leads you through winding passages—

you will find and open

our Ardennes Forest