Quotes from Yves Bonnefoy

Our hands full or not: The same abundance. Our eyes open or shut: The same light.

Unknowing, let us sleep. Chest against chest, Our breathing mingled, hand in hand without dreams.

Clouds, this evening The same as always, like thirst, The same red dress, unfastened. Imagine, passerby, Our new beginnings, our eagerness, our trust.

Since fire's born of fire, why should we desire To gather up its scattered ash. On the appointed day we surrendered what we were To a vaster blaze, the evening sky.

Let our bodies try To ford a wider time, Our hands not know The other shore.

In each painting, I think, it's as if God were giving up on finishing the world.

Dreaming is a language

Celle qui ruine l'etre, la beaute . . .

Mais je ne puis rien te répondre: car les mots Ont ceci de cruel qu'ils se refusent À ceux qui les respectent et les aiment Pour ce qu'ils pourraient être, non ce qu'ils sont.

I sense you in the secret of all the paintings I love. I hear you stumbling at the stony core of the only books I read, the few I know how to read.

La poésie est active dans toutes les formes de création. C'est elle qui en fait la beauté, laquelle est un éveil, un cri d'alarme.

In each painting, I think, it's as if God were giving up on finishing the world.