Gabrielle Quinn & Jean-Paul Martinon
Larmerieur – Jean-Paul Martinon
Rear Window Publications
1993 © Jean-Paul
Martinon
Seated at the prow of a coracle
Raft or ocean liner
Powered by hand, sail, or engine
And unpredictable currents
There is someone in the universe that furrows the cosmic flow
Pretending to be a master
There is someone in the universe that has a disagreeable tendency
To laugh and be tearful
There is someone in the universe whose reflection in the mirror
Does not disturb
S/he is called Larmerieur
It is a simple biped
Filled with blood
A plurality amongst pluralities
An unfinished prototype
That we will begin to render here or
There:
The hips are joined together
So are the shoulders
And out of these four joints
(That make up a torso)
Sprout two arms and two legs
Bent
At once temple and offering
Smiling with relief and anticipation
Presence discharging
Exhilaration Crouched
At once giver and thief
Agonising distress
Receiving presence
Desolation, hopelessness
Thus set one against the other
Larmerieur
This little glabrous body barely clothed
Is lulled by the sound of sea currents
Laughing
Crying
Shattering
The mirror that reflects his own image
Never the same
Never the other
Never both, or their opposites
S/he knows it
That’s why s/he cries
That’s why s/he laughs
At the end of some imaginary time span
Tired of the ebb and flow
Tired of self-contemplation (or self-searching)
(Ephemeral constructions / shuddering difference)
And
Eager to sew up its tissue of imaginary inconsistencies
And to shack up with its own reflection
Larmerieur
In an insane gesture
Throws the mirror
Takes an imaginary flask
And pours
An abstraction
Down its distended throat
These drops are a new potent remedy that will heal those invisible, uniting, and opposing centres specific to Larmerieurs.
They are supposed to soothe the obsessions of the mirror and are prescribed by rare alchemist-angels for all divided or united selves.
This is a remedy to be taken abstractedly
The liquid gradually mingles with blood
Shivers ripple through the body
As it lies inert on the raft
Suddenly
From its own shell
The body
The inner flow that supports it
Now takes it down into
Its own abyss
Abstract depression
Unfathomed
Abandoned
By the insignificance of its own assumptions
It stops
Looks back
One last time
And slides
Further into
Its inner void
Deserting the paleness of its own complexity
Under the roll of its own complicity
Alone in its fragile covering
Larmerieur
Exhausted by the pull of its flow
Lets itself be taken
Pure
No longer tangible
Limp
Unconscious
Still alive
Sad monochrome
In such neutrality
Under such pressure
The need for physical closeness
Is forgotten
(Breaking down is even less thinkable)
The body from which existence has departed
Finds itself abstractedly fading in its intimate depths
Disappearing
The remedy’s effects are overwhelming
All that remain are body stains
Watermarks at the bottom of the hull
Mere marks:
The verb
To abstract
Drowning
Itself
An ominous opacity
Silence
However, before it abstracts itself completely, it roots itself deep into its own self, subtracting itself from itself and leaving itself with no hope of recovery.
There, paralysed, anchored, deep inside itself, Larmerieur finds itself with no possible return.
From its depth
A beat is heard
Effects wear off
And
Comatose
Somnolent
Larmerieur resurfaces
First
A filigree
Then a shadow
Not directly Slowly A profile
Until the line
Tracing the body
Disappears and reveals itself to the sky
A sudden palpitation pushes it to finally re-materialise
Finding itself again on a shaft surrounded by water
Eyes open
A little bile
One in the other
One in opposition to the other
Swooning for renewed caresses
Longing for enticing penetrations
Fantasising of emerging whole (if the hypothesis is correct)
Or divided again (if it fails)
Dreaming of recovering its body
Its mirror
And to rejoin depths and surfaces
The hope causes the rebirth from abstract depths
From deep within its vessel
Raft or ocean liner
Larmerieur
Appears Amazed Unrecognizable Indescribable
Grace
A drop
A tear
The corner of the eye
Suddenly
An unexpected kaleidoscope
And then
Curiously
It
Appears
Ternary
(The hypothesis was truncated)
In a frightened and ecstatic movement (perplexity and curiosity emerging together), Larmerieur, this no longer abstracted being, pulls itself together, stretches out, rises, lifts itself up from its own depths, squirming, slashing against the currents, and taking with itself its curious abstraction, the remedy, the poison, sign, arrow, and square.
The wish does not fade
The echo entices a recurrence
Multiple variations
Perfect fugue
And aims again (with a kick of the legs)
To recover—its usual
Uneasiness—its usual
Anxiety
Bubble of air, water, and mud on the deep sea, Larmerieur’s ascent towards light is spiral.
Eddy currents
Panting for breath, the desire awakened, the fist clenches, opens up, the fingers stretch out. One more stroke and a form appears amidst the twinkles of light on the waves, peaceful drift on water, indefinable profile, disturbed horizon; she inhales, he exhales, it breathes, the heart beats, water trickles, together—all three.
To desire the theoretical womb is to fall into abstract travesty
Larmerieur re-emerges somehow at peace with itself and the vast ocean
Tired of enticing poisons
Done with the mirror
Repelled by criminal remedies
Larmerieur
In a curious outburst
Still full of doubt
Embraces and enjoins the skies
The roaring ocean
The grassland
And the water pipe
The triceps flexed, the chest high
The body disengages itself and flies off
In conflict
At the heart of its three-arm galaxy
Where the sign, its support, and its address
Alternate rhythm
Break harmony
London, 1993 / 2007
