La flâneuse

“The writer should never be ashamed of staring. There is nothing that does not require his attention.”    – Flannery O’Conner

 

“Poetry fettered, fetters the human race. Nations are destroyed or flourish in proportion as their poetry, painting, and music are destroyed or flourish.”   – William Blake

 

“The voice of passion is better than the voice of reason. The passionless cannot change history.”   – Czeslaw Milosz

 

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La flâneuse

 

C’est moi –  la flâneuse ( le flâneur)

Moth eaten – béret noir

My imperial crown

Climbing, descending

Village to village

All about town

Meandering the streets,

Villages and cities of

La belle France

Like Walt Whitman

Declarations of poetry

Observations – running

Commentary of my

Scrutiny – meditations,

Entreaties, prayers, odes,

Declarations in verse

Poetry – my creed

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If you look up the word today flâneuse – feminine of flâneur, the dictionary would give the word stroll. Yet recently I read a brief passage describing 19th century poets in Paris as a flâneur – one who strolled about the streets of Paris crying out in verse much as the American poet, Walt Whitman was known to do on the streets of Manhattan.

Bisous,

Léa