Reed Venrick lives on his orange grove farm in Central Florida, USA, and formerly studied Italian at the Università per Stranieri di Perugia, in Italy, French at the Alliance Francaise in Paris, and taught English for a year in Saudi Arabia, where he first read the books of T.E. Lawrence. He now spends his winters in Florida and his summers in France. Reed previously had his poem I Am Francis published in The Quiet Reader Edition #3.
“A l’heure ou blanchit la campagne”
(Victor Hugo)
INTRODUCTION
Out walking home that day,
I found myself on a street
Not my planned route, just
A summer’s day when
I discovered one of those shifts
Of space, a strange time
As when philosophers say, time
Zig-zagged its’ paradoxical
Way down an oddly-angled
Cause-and-effect path,
For that afternoon, my usual
Walking passage was blocked,
By a hit-and-run pedestrian
Accident, so I was diverted
Down a street that appeared
To beckon me to follow,
As dreams often will, and later,
I would reflect—if I hadn’t
Gone out in that dangerous
Street, there would have been
Another season, another fall,
Summer or spring, another
Birthday to reflect on what
My life was fated to evolve.
ONE
But there she was, standing
Slender and solitary, her face
Bent down, eyes almost hid
In left hand, in the shadow
Of that colossal, gothic cathedral,
And around her pale face, a circling
Hood of clover flowers, as they say
There in Strasbourg, foregrounding
Her elegant “visage,” and as I
Drew closer I strangely understood
What she said, though I did not
Comprehend a single word, yet
I understood: “Bon jour, je t’ai vous
Attendu,” and though she did not use
The progressive verb form in that
Curious way French grammar
Avoids, I translated it as “Bon
Jour, I am waiting for you.” Her
Words made me pause, I turned,
I glanced around, I almost
Backed away, almost bolted like
A frightened horse, but where
Was I to retreat or go? I, like
One who has found himself
Caught in a cannon-sighted
Field, and wasn’t it Napoleon
Who said—“out of the many,
Is not today as good as any?”
And no doubt he knew better
Than most, because his famed
Orders killed quite the many,
Though he maintained on his
Last island stand, he only acted
“Pour la defense de la France.”
I tried not to flinch, tried to steady
Burning nerves down my sweaty
Mind, because I did not doubt
Who she was, and I knew why
She waited patiently for me,
For no one but an angel could
Show such a melancholy, and
Wistful smile, as one who had
Seen the river of human blood
That had flowed down these
Streets in those many wars
That traded Alsace-Lorraine
Like pieces on a chess board,
Where cultures crowd together,
Where border conflicts never
Cease. But there she stood,
Statue-still, with marble
Eyes and svelte body and
he alabaster skin of one
Who came from another world.
TWO
Was it not written in that
Flowing, graceful style,
Fitting a practiced French hand,
Carved into the marble sign,
Bolted to the cathedral wall?
That once Napoleon himself
Rode his white steed down
This street, and echoes still
Resound from the hooves
Of a thousand-shoed horses
Behind, and half-a-million pairs
Of boots—he, that self-willed man
Who for years held the European
World like a map in his hands,
Like an expert horseman,
Holding firm the reins
Of a powerful horse, prancing
Down a cobbled street, and
Who can forget, what he said
To the half-million soldiers who
Waited to hear his command
And the famed wave of hand,
“That as long as the sun is shining,
And the air clear of mistral smoke,
Then today is as good as any
And better than most, so do not
To hesitate, do not turn away or
Flinch, even when the hot blood
Of youth overflows the creeks
And fills a soldier’s hobnail boots,”
Because in the end, all rivers
Finally find a way to wind their way
To their fated sea or ocean home,
For as the French say in retrospect:
“Dans le grand inconnu.” As that
Sky-high ancient tower bell tolled
Above, down below at cathedral
Doors, masses crowded ‘round
But the angel still stood solitary,
Waiting, while she gazed across
At me with a melancholy smile,
Behind those elegant, ivory fingers
And facial beauty showing calm
Continence that only an angel
Could bring to an overcast day,
So common in eastern France,
Yet a day showing off summer’s
Grace, a time when petite snow-
Balls of clover rise over the fertile
Fields of glowing-green Burgundy.
“Et moi,” there was nothing I could
Figure or focus, but I did recall
That I’d once read an ancient writer
Named “Luke,” in English translation,
That “The angels need no words,
For they speak in silence,” but what
That was supposed to mean, I never
Knew ’til now. So in the end, I felt
Grateful that I’d been summoned by
An angel, who reached back her fingers,
Warm and soft as spring leaves, and
Without a word, we drifted away from
The madding crowd, drifting on through
The Light in August, where a slow-motion
River of time carried us over a field
Of clover—into the fading twenty-one
Shades of blue, where the countryside
Became the silence of Belleau wood.
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