The trees of Butte Chaumont!
I know their shapes,
their branches, forked,
they took the same turns I took.
We know each other.
and when I first see them again
their needles tremble.
Antoine Gasq makes sculptures
at one-one-eight Rue des Couronnes.
I stopped in to visit him,
his face whitened when he saw me
“It is not possible” he said, in French.
“Mark I was just talking about you,
. . . five minutes ago,
for the first time I think,
. . . in years.”
“Do you recognize this?” he asked, and patted a table covered with figures.
“I think of you every time I put something down”, he said.
Pictures of his children dusty with plaster,
Were tacked above the desk.
Six years ago, before I saw him last
the first was not born.
He is working well
And about to move to a bigger studio
in the suburbs.
He turns to a cabinet and produces some cognac.
Time for a break.
He pours two glasses, on the old table.
"Salut!"
The girls at the Patisserie on Rue de Belleville
are grown up, and probably married.
I recognized them,
They did not recognize me.
I bought a pear tart,
which they wrapped in the same paper
just as their mother wrapped sweets
when they were little and watching
how she did things.
Some things do not change.
