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As I mentioned to some of you
in a creative writing class,

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I have a real interest
in the prose poem.

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And I'd like to begin my reading
tonight with a prose poem

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that I translated from the
French poet, Max Jacob,

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from a collection
called The Dice Cup.

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It's a poem, which is like
many others in the collection,

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heavily influenced by
Jacob's finding World War I

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a trauma which entered his
psyche in profound ways.

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Very much the same
way that Rilke--

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that Trakl, excuse me Trakl felt
about World War I or Wilfred

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Owen.

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And he wrote a number
of poems about the war

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and I translated
about 10 of them.

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I'm going to read one
before reading my own work.

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This prose poem
is called The War.

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At night, the
surrounding boulevards

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are filled with snow.

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The bandits are soldiers.

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They attack me with
laughs and sabers.

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They strip me.

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I run away only to fall into
the hands of another band.

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Is this the courtyard
or a barracks?

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Or one of an inn?

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Nothing but sabers.

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Nothing but lances.

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It's snowing.

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They stick me with a syringe.

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It's a poison meant to kill me.

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The head of a skeleton, veiled
in crepe bites my finger.

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The Hades of street
lamps casts on the snow.

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The light of my death.

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