Your Name
by Marguerite Yourcenar (translation)
janine canan
Your name, given to you by your mother.
Your name, poured down my bitter throat like a drop of poisoned honey.
Your name, that I cried under every sky and wept in every bed.
Your name, that I read in the water-marks on every page of my misery.
Your name, clear as the tear shed on us by one of the Angels.
Your name, like a beautiful naked child who rolled in the mud.
Your name, that bruises my mouth.
Your name, with which I sleep like a talisman.
Your name, like a sentence which condemns me to banishment.
Your name, that I moan like a beggar who continues her lament
even at the gates of a city gone up in flames.
Your name, where so many sordid stories perch like flies.
Your name, that people speak as if it were just anyone's.
Your name, X for the unknown that is your self.
Your baptismal name, inscribed in the black register of the Devil
and the golden book of God.
Your name, that nothing could ever make me forget.
Your name, with your memory the only thing you can never take
from me, since anyone under blue heaven may utter it.
Your name, each letter of which is a nail in my crucifixion.
Your name, the only one I'll remember on Resurrection morning.
