Guillevic: Cats

 Guillevic is rarely if ever compared to Marianne Moore. Moore collages, she is fascinated with the vast world of print, and thus her observations have that referential echo, always. Guillevic seems, on the contrary, to want his poem to be the first ever appearance of these words in this order on the page. Yet both look at objects and especially at animals and see a certain objective self-referentiality, that supposedly only human trait. The pathetic fallacy depends, of course, on picking on homo sapiens as the only thing with an organ that works out the wonder of the self, and thus the self’s reflection of the self, infinite vanity and embarrassment. But what if the pathetic fallacy is just this anthropo gigantism?

Guillevic has been translated into English by giants – Denise Levertov, Donald Justice, Seamus Heany. But if a wee little Facebook citizen is going to be scared of giants, he might as well just post cat pics and be done with it, infinitely. So, I’m thinking I’ll translate Guillevic’s Cats, which comes from the Mammifere collection from 1981. There is also Rats.

The cat looks

Blinded by its look.

*

Lights

Don’t wet

The cat.

He splashes enough

On himself.

*

The cat secretes silence,

Rejects those who soil

This netting

into their charivari

*

The trainer

Of oceans

According to his stare.

*

The cat is not

Without a semaphore.

He has his tail.

*

The cat

Rarely weeps.

He tries on a smile

From time to time.

*

This shusher

One could say

Sometimes

Likes to hear a conversation.

*

For certain people

The cat

Is sent against them

By the shadow.

*

Almost all cats

Seem satisfied

By their heritage.

*

The cat

Sits on the table

As if he had

Won for all times.

*

Only he is literate

In the quartz watch.

*

The cat

Doesn’t hurl himself against the laws

But gets around them.

*

The cat is not among those

Who like to be petted.

It pleases him

That you want to.

*

As if there were nothing

And suddenly a great flame

The explosion.

*

The universe

Of the cat.

The other universe.

*

The cat doesn’t care

To show his math

Save

To those who proclaim

The depths

Of his look.

*

The cat knows nothing

Of all the stuff

In the dictionaries.

But knows something

About what they are missing.

*

From what prehistoric era

Does the cat get his taste

For fish?

And what is the story

Of his need

For mice?

*

The glory

Of trapping a bird

In the city

Without leaving the apartment.

*

The cat

Traps the mice

To make himself a game

Of prolonged torture.

*

This cat

Does not bow

Except before the meals

Of an oriental prince.

*

The cat

Can’t be put to guard or spy

For others.

*

One does what one can

Says the popular wisdom.

Him, he can’t do much.

He reigns.

*

He is like that

Because he is

A cat.

Completely cat.

*

Go away my cat!

This possessive

Only engages me.

*

Funny how mystery

Is calming

When it presents

Day after day

By silence.

*

Escaped

From the cosmic shipwreck,

The cat

Licks itself.