Pierre Alferi, translated by Cole Swensen

Pierre Alferi’s And the Street (tr. Cole Swensen) is an Editor’s Selection in the Stephen Mitchell Translation Series. Here are three poems from that collection.

And the Street is a remarkable set of poetic texts. …Cole Swensen’s stunning translation is pitch perfect.
—Norma Cole

In forms ranging from free verse to the Chinese juxtaposition of characters, language becomes event—and a second time in Cole Swensen’s felicitous translation.
—Rosemarie Waldrop


(shy) 

arrived flush silence silence growing

glance caught across lost greeting

talk caught mouth almost saying

air meeting thought bubble bursting

(meeting) 

smooth smooth cheek under hair floating

thin thin arm under sleeve opening

marble table rag damp wiping

creased forehead heightened blush rising

(the years) 

garden olden gazebo wooden merry-go-round

serious child now children ago

silver counting rings peg hanging

white sight in dust and dust troubling

Pierre Alferi (1963–2023) was a French poet, novelist, essayist, and one of the pioneers of the cinépoème, a fusion of short film and poetry. He published fifteen collections of poetry and four novels and collaborated with various visual artists and musicians on a variety of hybrid projects and performances. He translated works by John Donne, Giorgio Agamben, Meyer Schapiro, and others. He was awarded residencies at the Fondation Royaumont and the French Academy in Rome and taught at the École des Beaux Arts in Paris and the European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland.

Cole Swensen is an American poet and translator. The author of twenty volumes of poetry and one volume of critical essays, she is also the co-editor of the Norton anthology American Hybrid. Her poetry has been selected for the Iowa Poetry Prize, the SF State Poetry Center Book Award, and the National Poetry Series, and has been a finalist for the National Book Award. She has translated over twenty volumes of French poetry and fiction and regularly translates articles and catalogue essays in the field of visual arts. She won the PEN USA Award in Translation for her translation of Jean Frémon’s novel Island of the Dead. She teaches in the Literary Arts Department at Brown University.

ISSN 2472-338X
© 2023