From the Crucifixion by Jean Cocteau

From the Crucifixion

An accident happens
so fast. The other
scarecrow too attentive
to its metamorphosis into branches
of a tree into knots of trees into bones
of a tree a whole bark
of skin of a twisted pine which bleeds
and cracks close within a dream almost
mythological terrified
the angels crying: Quick! Quick!
There’s not a minute
to lose. Those innocent fellows
circling around
crying at the top of their lungs and losing feathers
which blinded him and
stuck fast to his wounds.

Most Serene. The escutcheon
of murders.
Animals
kneeling and in tears. Keys to the number
of seven. The triangular
wheel of miracles.
The hand
which is not one. The eye
which is not one.
The moral nausea
of the dream. The simple
difficulty of being. The bohemian girl
asleep. The castle
of the chess game. Its free bishop.

On a black school desk
where she raises
her June bugs death
bites her nails bites here penholder
licks the gold beetle of the purple
ink bites rule and licorice
crosses out drawl lines
bites the piebald blotter
draws lines sticks out her tongue
squints licks the beetle
under the eyes the priest what boldness!
But why doesn’t he see
that she’s
copying.

The entire stupefied organism expels
outside the liquid
to avoid the muddy roads
becoming impassable.
It begins
under the arms makes detours
loses its way regroups itself and forms a river
net of anatomy.

The rout came from rusty nails crushing
the very delicate mechanism of a factory
accustomed to working at night without lights.
That ids why the whole inside
rushed out
looking for some exit.
That water of anguish hooked on the angle
of the still living cornices
its drops mad with fear which leap
into the void with desperation.

What cannot be said (and yet
what can’t i say with
my way of forcing words
to be silent) what can’t
be said is the honey
of the bees of the agony. It
flows from the give it binds
with a filthy vertiginous net
the lost profiles at the foot
of a caduceus. You guess
what it’s made of.

And here, a profile
of a face thrown backwards linked to the vinestock
of the legs by
a cloth of a blue similar to the red
bears
evenly balanced on the brow a pillar
of salt. And that other face
in profile shapeless because
of the wen of tears
glues it cheek against the terrible
resin.

A thunder of bedecked wagons with benches
a thunder of clusters of acacia a
thunder of marriage beds
dragged to the floor above
a thunder of barricades
a thunder of cannonade
a thunder of men crying: Over here!
Over here! A thunder
of houses decked with flags acclaims
to heaven a spurt
of blood turned wine. Angel Cégeste
blew the trumpet. And the shadow
of the object rising up became
the object.

It tore from eat to west
the cloth of silence. You heart
silence cry out in such
a way that it was unbearable
to the ear of the heart. A
spray of ink most certainly
full of masterpieces
splashing a black flight
of compromising papers burned in haste.
While a torrential rain
of bayonets
savagely finished off the victims.

On my knees to the right
and to the left. Alone alas
of my species (no reason
to be proud) under a coat
of mail made in figures under
an armor of noise
alone on my knees on the left
on the right—the snow with hands of a blind woman
putting on the table cloth—I close
on my knees alone of my species
alas in this room whose crime
took place the yellow
mouth of my learned wound capable
of saying a few words.