Franck André Jamme lives and works in Paris and North Burgundy, France. Since 1981, he has published thirteen
volumes of poetry and fragments, such as Pour les simples, La Récitation de l’oubli, Encore une attaque silencieuse
and Extraits de la vie des scarabées (Fata Morgana, Melville and Flammarion), as well as numerous limited editions
illustrated by such artists as James Brown, Suzan Frecon, Zao Wou-Ki, Acharya Vyakul, Jan Voss and Jaume Plensa,
among others. He has been praised by major poets : Henri Michaux has referred to him as « a writer of rare quality ».
In 1983, René Char asked him to oversee the publication of his Complete Works for the Bibliothèque de la Pléiade.
He is also an independent curator focusing on contemporary Indian art, especially on tantric, brut and tribal works –
for Fondation Cartier Paris, Centre Georges Pompidou Paris, The Drawing Center New York, California College for
the Arts in San Francisco and several galleries in Paris (Galerie du Jour/Agnès b.), London (Frith Street Gallery) and
New York (Feature and Lawrence Markey). He has translated into French, poetry by friends such as Lokenath
Bhattacharya, Udayan Vajpeyi and John Ashbery, including Ashberry’s The Recitation of Forgetting, Black Square
Editions, New York, 2001. These poets have translated Jamme’s work into Bengali, Hindi and English. His poetry is
included in The New French Poetry (Bloodaxe Books 1996) and The Yale Book of French Poetry (Yale University
Press 2004). In 2005 he was awarded the “Grand Prix de Poésie de la Société des Gens de Lettres” for his life work.

Extract from La Récitation de l’oubli, Fata Morgana, 1986, Flammarion, 2005.

----------Des yeux, puis une bouche. Et des taches, soudain, qui brouillaient ce visage, le ciel était bien-
tôt criblé de mouches d’or. Je luttais, elle sentait, elle disait : « Si au fond rien n’apparaissait, ni ne dis-
paraissait ? Tout voit, tout parle. »

----------Je soufflais, je ne savais plus, je soufflais. J’avançais au cœur de la force, c’était tout. « Tu verras
un jour l’embrasure », disait-elle. « Ta désobéissance, anguille dans le sang du monde ; ta volonté,
presque un désir. »

----------Chemin de l’est, pierreux, qui monte et qui demande ! Là-haut, l’ermite gardait le col, elle
savait son histoire. Qu’il venait des plateaux du nord, du pays où sur le
chapeau frise le duvet d’aigle ; qu’il animait les peaux et la vieille chanson. Il lui avait montré sa langue,
un soir : « C’est sans appui que l’on profère. Tout vient par le ravissement. »

----------Elle disait : « Tu t’abandonnes et te recueilles. Ecoute, tu respires. Tu frôles parfois la racine –
à peine, je le sais, mais je l’ai déjà vue trembler. Il n’y a rien derrière les choses, il y a seulement les
choses. Qui se multiplient, et encore, et indéfiniment.
Alors ? »

----------Et je me demandais : « Que fais-tu là, sur cette route, ton visage à la main – qui se mélange
dans ses pas, pousse une pierre, comme ça, en pousse une autre ? Tandis qu’un seul trait rouge, sur
l’ocre de la terre. Mur dormant d’énergie et de sang, de peur et de puissance. D’autres épreuves. T’es-tu
trouvé, l’enfant ? T’es-tu perdu ? ».

Extract from La Récitation de l’oubli, Fata Morgana, 1986, Flammarion, 2005.

----------Eyes, then a mouth. And spots, suddenly, that cloud this face, soon the sky was pitted with
gold flies. I wrestled, she felt it, she said : “If, ultimately, nothing appears nor disappears? Everything sees,
everything speaks.”

----------I breathed out, I didn’t know any more, I breathed out. I advanced toward the core of
strength, that was all. “You’ll see a doorway some day”, she said. “Your disobedience, needle in the
world’s blood; your will, almost a desire.”

Road of the east, stony, that climbs and exacts! Up there, the hermit kept watch over the pass,
she knew his story. That he came from the northern plateaus, from the country where the eagle’s down
curls on the hat; that he brought to life the drum skins and the old song. He had stuck out his native
tongue at her, one evening:“It’s without any support that one utters. Everything comes to pass through
enchantment.”

----------She said: “You abandon yourself and you observe a few moments of silence. Listen, you’re
breathing. Sometimes you graze the root – barely, I know, but I’ve already seen it tremble. There is noth-
ing behind things, there are only things. Which multiply, still, and indefinitely. So?”

---------- And I wondered : “What are you doing there, on this highway, your face in your hand – that
is muddled with its own footsteps, pushes a stone, like that, then pushes another. While a single red line,
against the earth’s ocher. Sleeping wall of energy and blood, of fear and force. Other trials. Did you find
yourself, child? Did you lose yourself?”

translated by John Ashbery