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Syndic Literary Journal

“My mother’s death”

Written by Nicole Laurent-Catrice

Translated from the French by Dominique Hecq

Narrated by Kristine Doll

France

My mother’s death

foreshadowing my own

that my daughter will live

as I lived yours

Long line of women

whose story you’d tell me in the kitchen

Long seam of sons and threads

some ripping us

so others could stitch us back

long red thread running up

step by step

from grandmother to grandmother

blood flowing

from moon to moon

for pain and gain

blood loss

only to give life to new blood.

 

Nicole Laurent-Catrice was born in North of France. She organized meetings of poets in Brittany and produced programs about poetry in the radio for fifteen years. She published about twenty books of poems (in Belgium and France, but so translated in Sofia and Kiev) two novels, and some essays.. She collaborated with artists on fifteen books. She translated and published twenty poets especially from the Spanish language but  also from European countries such as: Portugal, Ireland, Hungary, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, Italy, alone or with someone else. She was invited to international festivals of poetry, in Mexico, Italy, Romania, Dublin, Alicante, Vilnius, Medellin, Caracas.

 

 

Dominique Hecq grew up in the French-speaking part of Belgium. An author and translator, she now lives on unceded sovereign Wurundjeri land, Melbourne. Hecq writes across genres and disciplines and sometimes across tongues. Her creative works include a novel, five collections of stories, and twelve books of poetry. Among other honors, Hecq won the inaugural AALITRA Prize for Translation.

 

Compiled/Published by LeRoy Chatfield
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