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"New / Horizons / Nouveaux" Étincelles d'écriture poétique en anglais

Evènement | 11 juin 2021

Par temps de pandémie, l'atelier d'écriture en anglais a été bien plus qu'un espace d'écriture : c'était un refuge, où chacun.e pouvait librement laisser courir son imagination. Voici le fruit de cette rêverie, de cette pérégrination...

Claude Monet, Nymphéas


Par l'atelier d'écriture en anglais
Creative Writing Workshop

Dirigé par Héloïse THOMAS

À l'occasion du festival étudiant L'Art au Moulin 2021




"Nous nous sommes penché.e.s sur toutes les formes d'expression, car nous préférions mettre en relation plutôt que d'écarter, et nous avons pu voir, ensemble, comment, lorsque le reste du monde plonge dans l'incertitude, l'écriture et l'art en général demeurent essentiels pour penser et rêver autrement.

Les textes publiés à cette occasion reflètent les multiples sensibilités qui, le temps de cet atelier, se sont rencontrées et en sont ressorties enrichies par l'amour commun de la créativité."
 

Textes de

Wassim BETTAHAR   -   Sourour ELFOURTI

Kristina GEORGIEVA   -   MAVROSS   -   Maureen PRADAL



 

Wassim BETTAHAR


Blue piano on my fingers

Blue piano on my fingers
Each step you make brings me closer
Through the wind we’re dancing
And beneath the ocean we’re breathing.
Blue piano on my fingers
Creating your heavenly shelter
Where angels could be sleeping
And where demons stop bleeding.
Blue piano on your fingers
To make the Universe even more older
Even if you’re trying
Please, keep your soothing smile in.
Blue piano on our fingers
Far from the others
I’ll hold you like a flower
For the rest of my life, deeper and deeper.





Who knows ?

Who knows what a secluded guy can do ?
Who knows what a love seeker can feel ?
Who knows what a man who discovers himself will do ?
Who knows what a transit lover will be ?
Like a leaf carried away by gravity,
Failing to see what is hidden in the fog
Distinguishing only a weakened glow away
Which remains out of reach.
Like a leaf carried away by a breeze,
That manages to reach the glow but seems
To suddenly lose interest in it
Since it was better as a nebulous idea.
Like a leaf using the wind as force,
Appropriating its own new story
Finding out who or what it really is
Finally breathing for the first time.
Like a leaf in the eye of the storm controlling it,
Finally seeking to hang on to the tree
Proud to love and be loved beyond everything
Being one with its dreams, with itself.
The leaf is you,
The tree is us,
The storm is your will,
And its mastery is your unbounded strength.




 

Sourour ELFOURTI
« Sense and ink. When your spirit asks for it, let it take over you.
Only then, you’ll experience a fulfilled story.
Only then you’ll remain throughout every lifetime. »





Cheeky Serenity

Staring at the sleeping pond makes me want to splash its cheeky serenity. And so, I go ahead and proceed with it. Straight away, mortification rushes into the bloody threads of my limbs. It moves hand in hand with the circular vibrating ripples. As for comfort and envy? They do not get along. And it’s delicious once it’s settled down.

I, then, let the chaos I caused go back to its life devoid of me. And boy, can it get any more magical?


Claude Monet, Nymphéas
Claude MONET, Les Nymphéas





The Girl with the Look

Say, my dear, what do you see, when you read her identity? What does the reflection in her eyes unravel? I’ll uncover for you what I diagnose. There’s the light that lies within. A porcelain-fair complexion that’s neat, pure, innocent to the smell. Her body is directed elsewhere, yet she cannot help but look backwards. She’s looking at you. She’s being pulled in, no matter how sumptuous of a thrill the after-color is. Being pierced with pining in anticipation… Doesn’t that look delicately languishing?


Vermeer, Girl with a pearl earring
Johannes VERMEER, La jeune fille à la perle





Unleafness
 
Unending hours of grey sky had turned every one of my colors into the same one. There is a French saying that goes: “after the rain comes the rainbow”. After walking miles and miles in the clouded road that’s less traveled by, I finally saw it. The ‘bow’. My beau. It felt like gushing water warming up my sore atoms after I’d walked through the cutting rain. Every sunbeam that came to be was mending my broken bones. And unlike what it sounds like, it didn’t hurt at all. Sunlight was finally taking over after a hurtful and self-harming weather. I, then, think of you. Magnetizing how I always do, huh? I just wonder how it’ll feel like to have you by my side, when light paints my body. Would you get resentful toward the light of day for raining on me? Or would you find me more mesmerizing than ever? You seek for novelty, so I gracefully let the ticking of time regenerate me. Now, please, my dear, would you get me leafless and love me a little bit more? I promise, the pigments on my silhouette would make you even more transcended to have me.

I hoped for us to be cordial after we’d caused each other’s misery. Didn’t we use to find comfort in each other’s embrace after the sky had poured its heart out? Or was it in the middle of the cataract? My guess is: it was during the whole thing. We’d loved each other through every crime, every dazzling star and bleeding sound. Our souls intertwined to form a celestial body. They burned, and they burned, and they burned… So much so they consumed each other altogether. My dear, even the Sun has an expiry date. But I guess we ignited even swifter than in record time. How can two souls express tenderness to each other after they’d ripped each other apart? You know what’s required to sketch it is no more.

And yet my being is the embodied reminiscence of what lit us inside. How could it ever be otherwise? Every drop of red was like two unforeseen magnets, unconditionally lured to each another. The collisions were going back and forth, until pieces got so wrecked they turned into smoking powder. But at least it burst into magnificent flames... Didn’t it? Or was it what laid us in ruins? And tell me, my dear… Is there any chance we’re a reflection of a phoenix?

Never mind, let me hold on to this fantasy. Do you recall how we used to cherish it, when the sky opened a deluge down on us? You went wild for it once you figured out I’d be keener to let you in. In every unimaginary way, you sought to fulfill me.

“Rain doesn’t make you need me”, you used to say. “But maybe rain makes you a little bit more enamored of me?”. You knew me so well. All too well.

Say, my dear, isn’t it romantic how rain made us completely lose it? We’d loved each other most, indeed. We’d dance through the rain, we’d merge in every possible way, we’d collide, we’d fly and collapse... Only to do it all over again. Unraveling our green leaves kept us afloat every time. Until it didn’t. Now, tell me, my dear. Don’t you long for my delicious softness?





 
Kristina GEORGIEVA
« Great reader. Amateur writer. Passionate human being. »





Being Human

‘We’re only human’
I hear it all the time.
As if one is flawed
Slightly, but that is fine.

If Man is the flaw itself,
And has an original sin,
Then darkness is born,
Inherently living within.

Yet I aim for better,
To walk in the light.
Well, it does not matter,
Impure is my heart.

Be kind and helpful—
You reap what you sow.
Then go to bed blissful,
Like that is enough.

Ruin, chaos, and death
Is what prevails on earth.
Man’s forever in debt,
Lost touch with what’s worth.

Salvation is slipping
From your tight grasp.
My dear fellow Faust,
See you in Hell.





A Poet’s Recipe

First, there is a raw vision
And many ways to cook it.
Slice and chop with precision
Fillet using razor-sharp wit.

Strong words will add flavor
When sizzled on high heat.
Juicy rhythms you’ll savor—
A ritual for delicate treats.

Knead it but don’t overdo it.
When ready, you shall let it rest.
Then for a moment forget it,
And let yourself be impressed.

Come back with different eyes,
And a renewed appetite,
Does it lack spice?
Is it a well-balanced bite?

A masterly work steadily
Builds its richness of taste,
Which unfolds unexpectedly
Into a heavenly zest.





 
MAVROSS

Let’s dance to the end of the world

Even if this world is doomed to destruction.

I want to hear you scream from the top of your lungs, I want to hear you sing, I want to see you dance, I want to see you enjoy the little time you have left because why not?

And only when you have done so,

You’ll realize that the view you’ll get when you jump out of this building is the most beautiful in the world.





The Knight

Go, go my valiant knight,
go fight on bloody lands.
I will stay here alone and saddened,
Watching the roses wither.

Go, go my valiant knight,
Far from your beloved homeland.
You will struggle every night,
And to wait for you I would dedicate my whole life.

Go, go my valiant knight,
Leave your wife at home.
I’ll sing my love for you,
Hoping you will be back safe.

Go, go my valiant knight,
Go get yourself killed on the battlefield.
Of red you will come back stained,
Just like the roses now withered.

Go, go my valiant knight,
To the merciful afterlife.
I will join you in a few years,
And we will be close to God together.





 
Maureen PRADAL
« A few steps into poetry for sensorial exploration. »





regrets of a dawn lover

my anger boils on an empty stomach,
in the dark,
the aggressive leds display a digital clock.
it strikes one.

work sleep,
work sleep,
my mind juggles between two imperatives.
they fight every night
and tonight,
they frantically nurture my insanity.

i want to wake up and hear the sound silence makes as the birds chatter above empty streets
i want to hear cooks greeting their producers on pavements below expressing their delight over crunchy greens
i want to set foot on the top of the city
to feel the blood flushing my cheeks
to lean in the wind stroking my hair
to let the sun, shining emperor, kiss my cold skin
i want to embrace this new day and feel as powerful as they say it is

but it is too late as it strikes two
i must surrender to morpheus
he will keep me captive
and i will miss dawn


Forme rose




Tokyo, 1913-1915

Tokyo





In memory of E
In memory of E