A poem for Valentine's Day, reposting from last year on the BHTM message board. The first version is in English and then the original French version that I found on the web. As we know, Andre Breton coined the phrase "surrealism." This poem appeared in a book called, "Technicians of the Sacred," I think because it has a chant like quality that draws on imagery of the subconscious much like shamans do during ceremonies when trying to connect to the universal or divine. (Thanks for suggesting this, Cindy) Free Union (1931) Andre' Breton, 1896-1966 Trans. David Antin from "L'Union Libre" My wife whose hair is a brush of fire Whose thoughts are summer lightning Whose waist is an hourglass Whose waist is the waist of an otter caught in the teeth of a tiger Whose mouth is a bright cockade with the fragrance of a star of the first magnitude Whose teeth leave prints like the tracks of whitemice over snow Whose tongue is made out of amber and polished glass Whose tongue is a stabbed wafer The tongue of a doll with eyes that open and shut Whose tongue is incredible stone My wife whose eyelashes are strokes in the handwriting of a child Whose eyebrows are nests of swallows My wife whose temples are the slate of greenhouse roofs With steam on the windows My wife whose shoulders are champagne Are fountains that curl from the heads of dolphins over the ice My wife whose wrists are matches Whose fingers are raffles holding the ace of hearts Whose fingers are fresh cut hay My wife with the armpits of martens and beech fruit And Midsummer Night That are hedges of privet and nesting places for sea snails Whose arms are of sea foam and a land locked sea And a fusion of wheat and a mill Whose legs are spindles In the delicate movements of watches and despair My wife whose calves are sweet with the sap of elders Whose feet are carved initials Keyrings and the feet of steeplejacks who drink My wife whose neck is fine milled barley Whose throat contains the Valley of Gold And encounters in the bed of the maelstrom My wife whose breasts are of the night And are undersea molehills And crucibles of rubies My wife whose breasts are haunted by the ghosts of dew-moistened roses Whose belly is a fan unfolded in the sunlight Is a giant talon My wife with the back of a bird in vertical flight With a back of quicksilver And bright lights My wife whose nape is of smooth worn stone and wet chalk And of a glass slipped through the fingers of someone who has just drunk My wife with the thighs of a skiff That are lustrous and feathered like arrows Stemmed with the light tailbones of a white peacock And imperceptible balance My wife whose rump is sandstone and flax Whose rump is the back of a swan and the spring My wife with the sex of an iris A mine and a platypus With the sex of an algae and old fashioned candles My wife with the sex of a mirror My wife with eyes full of tears With eyes that are purple armor and a magnetized needle With eyes of savannahs With eyes full of water to drink in prisons My wife with eyes that are forests forever under the axe My wife with eyes that are the equal of water and air and earth and fire.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> L'Union Libre` Andre Breton Ma femme à la chevelure de feu de bois Aux pensées d'éclairs de chaleur A la taille de sablier Ma femme à la taille de loutre entre les dents du tigre Ma femme à la bouche de cocarde et de bouquet d'étoiles de dernière grandeur Aux dents d'empreintes de souris blanche sur la terre blanche A la langue d'ambre et de verre frottés Ma femme à la langue d'hostie poignardée A la langue de poupée qui ouvre et ferme les yeux A la langue de pierre incroyable Ma femme aux cils de bâtons d'écriture d'enfant Aux sourcils de bord de nid d'hirondelle Ma femme aux tempes d'ardoise de toit de serre Et de buée aux vitres Ma femme aux épaules de champagne Et de fontaine à têtes de dauphins sous la glace Ma femme aux poignets d'allumettes Ma femme aux doigts de hasard et d'as de coeur Aux doigts de foin coupé Ma femme aux aisselles de martre et de fênes De nuit de la Saint-Jean De troène et de nid de scalares Aux bras d'écume de mer et d'écluse Et de mélange du blé et du moulin Ma femme aux jambes de fusée Aux mouvements d'horlogerie et de désespoir Ma femme aux mollets de moelle de sureau Ma femme aux pieds d'initiales Aux pieds de trousseaux de clés aux pieds de calfats qui boivent Ma femme au cou d'orge imperlé Ma femme à la gorge de Val d'or De rendez-vous dans le lit même du torrent Aux seins de nuit Ma femme aux seins de taupinière marine Ma femme aux seins de creuset du rubis Aux seins de spectre de la rose sous la rosée Ma femme au ventre de dépliement d'éventail des jours Au ventre de griffe géante Ma femme au dos d'oiseau qui fuit vertical Au dos de vif-argent Au dos de lumière A la nuque de pierre roulée et de craie mouillée Et de chute d'un verre dans lequel on vient de boire Ma femme aux hanches de nacelle Aux hanches de lustre et de pennes de flèche Et de tiges de plumes de paon blanc De balance insensible Ma femme aux fesses de grès et d'amiante Ma femme aux fesses de dos de cygne Ma femme aux fesses de printemps Au sexe de glaïeul Ma femme au sexe de placer et d'ornithorynque Ma femme au sexe d'algue et de bonbons anciens Ma femme au sexe de miroir Ma femme aux yeux pleins de larmes Aux yeux de panoplie violette et d'aiguille aimantée Ma femme aux yeux de savane Ma femme aux yeux d'eau pour boire en prison Ma femme aux yeux de bois toujours sous la hache Aux yeux de niveau d'eau de niveau d'air de terre et de feu | 
