Position - Léon Damas

For  J.D.

The days themselves

have taken on the shape

of African masks

indifferent

to any profanation

of quicklime

the homage of

moonlit sighs

any size

played on a piano

the refrain

repeated in

shrubbery

gondolas

et cetera

---

Léon Damas (1912 - 1978) French Guiana

Translated by Ellen Conroy Kennedy

Source: The Negritude poets: an anthology of translations from the French by Ellen Conroy Kennedy, Viking Press, 1975