Dreaming My Animal Selves/Le Songe de Mes Ames Animales by Helene Cardona

This bilingual collection is a series of poems to remind us of what gives birth both to the literary imagination and to identity. Je paie avec la mort de ma mère le prix de mes rêves tandis que je rêve la création d’un monde, tandis que je rêve de nouveaux souvenirs, tandis que je me rêve d’amour t’inonder. Il n’y a ni fin ni début, succombe, succombe, succombe. (“Dreamer” 60)Ĭonsidère ceci : sois fortunée, reconnaissante, considère ceci : sois vivante car l’ultime cadeau est donné avec la mort. I pay with my mother’s death for the price of my dreams as I dream the world into being as I dream new memories as I dream myself into love falling into you. There is no end and no beginning, surrender, surrender, surrender. As I awakened from this memory of my mother, I read these lines and was consoled for my loss:Ĭonsider this, be fortunate, grateful, consider this, be alive for the greatest gift is given with death. This memory came back to me as I read a collection of poetry by Hélène Cardona, Dreaming My Animal Selves / Le Songe de mes Âmes Animales (Salmon Poetry, 2013), for this is a collection of dreams, grieving, memory, and transcendence. Then I heard my mother’s voice and woke up to see a little bird that flew away toward the Bois de Boulogne. Shortly after my mother died, while napping near an open window of my apartment on Avenue Foch, I felt-or thought I felt-a hand touch mine.

Dreaming My Animal Selves/Le Songe de Mes Ames Animales by Helene Cardona