What Sparks Poetry a series of original essays that explores experiences and ideas that spark the writing of new poems. In our new series focused on Translation a group of poet-translators share a seminal experience in translation. Each Monday's delivery brings you the poem and an excerpt from the essay.  
Marie-Claire Bancquart
Translated from the French by Jody Gladding
—What did you say? Lost empires,
old age,
indecipherable writing, catastrophes?

—And me? At the present moment, it’s this piece of soap
I care about.

I’m holding onto it
white, solid without being hard.

Many other bars of soap have worn away,
softened, grew thinner in my hands.

Now,
six forty-seven AM, in July,
I’m clutching this piece

thanks to it I feel alive
despite earthquakes and the fall of Babylon.

*

—Vous dites? Empires disparus,
âge avancé,
indéchiffrables écritures, catastrophes?

—Moi, dans la seconde présente, c’est à ce morceau de savon
que je tiens.

Je me cramponne à lui
blanc, solide sans être rude.

Beaucoup d’autres savons dans mes mains
se sont usés, ont molli, ont minci.

Maintenant,
six heures quarante-sept, en juillet,
je serre ce morceau

grâce à lui je me sens vivante
malgré les tremblements de terre et la chute de Babylone.
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Cover of Marie-Claire Bancquart's book, "Toute Minute est Premiere Suivi De Tout Dermiers Poemes
What Sparks Poetry:
Jody Gladding on Marie-Claire Bancquart 's [—What did you say?  Lost empires,]

"Bancquart’s poems are spare, grounded, and, for all their attention to demise, surprisingly light. Just the thing for a pandemic. This poem with its 'lost empires' and 'catastrophes' counterbalanced by a shrinking soap bar seemed particularly suited to the moment. I was struck by Bancquart’s vertiginous shifts in scope/scale, producing the same effect they do in cartoons—making us laugh."
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Cover image of Harmony Holiday's book, MAAfA
"A Conversation with Harmony Holiday"

"But Hollywood Forever felt very reactionary. And for this book I thought: 'I don’t want to be reactionary. I just want to feel into what the hell is going on with me or with a particular set of catastrophes.' I wanted to pierce catastrophe with music and not use the archival spirit to intervene as much on where past and present blur."

via LOS ANGELES REVIEW OF BOOKS
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