In Dialogue with Paris Spleen by Baudelaire

Introduction

I was a refugee in Paris in 1981 and lived in the city for six months, and now, after forty-three years, while I was waiting for a test result that would tell me whether I had breast cancer, I returned as a writer in residence. I imagined a dialogue with the themes of Paris Spleen based on my memories as well as based on the present, but more from the female perspective.

The organising principle follows that of Paris Spleen by Baudelaire; fifty prose poems numbered. I start each poem of mine with an epigraph from Baudelaire’s poem in Louise Varèse’s translation (1890–1989; first published in 1947 with New Directions).

III
Artist’s Confiteor

The study of beauty is a duel in which the artist shrieks with terror before being overcome.

The owners of my present home must be clowns. The many photos of street art on the walls make me smile. It was my dream job as a child.

While the musicians travelling with us on the metro get some money, sometimes the beggars are met with less compassion. An accro begged in sing-song French, pulling the strings of my heart – soft voice, like a baby. One foot in the shoe, the other half out. A young girl he approached said plainly ‘no’. She had a clear, honest face and looked into his eyes meaning ‘sort yourself out,
I am poor, too’.

Die a little

Beauty hurts. It vibrates the lowest and highest strings of my being. I create, ...