Haunted Childhoods
Bibliography
Novels
Les yeux d’eau, Granby, Éditions Gaudet, 1975; Outremont, Lanctôt éditeur, 2002.
Mirage, Montréal, Éditions Hurtubise HMH, coll. “L’Arbre,” 1978; Outremont, Lanctôt éditeur, 2004.
Le papillon de Vénus, Hull, Éditions Vents d’Ouest, coll. “Azimuts,” 2000.
Poetry
L’œil sauvage, Mont-Saint-Hilaire, Publications Chant de mon pays, 1988.
“Le sablier” and “La bergerie du temps,” En marge du calendrier (collective), Montreal Triptyque, 1994.
“Une forêt dans Paris,” Arcade, n° 48: “La quête amoureuse” (collective), 1999.
“Tu es lumière et tu retourneras en lumière,” Le 11 septembre des poètes du Québec (collective), Montreal, Trait d’Union, 2002.
Short Stories (in Anthologies and Periodicals)
“Un archipel d’existence,” Les îles de l’âme, Montreal, Humanitas, 1994.
“L’assiette-à-tourmente,” L’instant fragile, Montreal, Humanitas, 1995.
“L’assiette-à-tourmente,” short story translated into Chinese, 1995.
“La chaise à bascule,” L’instinct farouche, Montréal, Humanitas, 1996.
“Cassures,” Arcade, n° 44: “Illusions,” 1998.
“Une carrière de silence,” Brèves littéraires, 2004.
“The United Slaves,” Brèves littéraires, “Concours Québec-Mexique,” 2004.
“Le tête-à-queue,” Arcade, n° 61: “Mascarade,” 2004.
Books for Children
Hello Moineau, Mont-Saint-Hilaire, Publications Chant de mon pays, 1985.
Voyez comme ils s’aiment, chants—poems for 6-7-8 years old, Montréal, Éditions d’enseignement religieux F.P.R., coll. “Bonne Nouvelle,” 1986.
À la Claire Fontaine, songs, Productions TVO, Collectif, 1991.
À la Claire Fontaine, tales, Productions TVO, Collectif, 1991.
Cannelle et Pruneau dans les feuilles de thé, Les contes Passe-Partout, Télé-Québec, 1992.
Le Tour du monde, songs, Mont-Saint-Hilaire, Publications Chant de mon pays, 2000.
Haunted Childhoods
Parliamentary of Canada Poet Laureate
Short Stories
Pauline MICHEL
Translated by Nigel Spencer
Copyright © 2006 by XYZ editeur and Pauline Michel
All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system without the prior written consent of the publisher - or, in the case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency - is an infringement of the copyright law.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Michel, Pauline
[Frissons d’enfants. English]
Haunted childhoods
Includes bibliographical references.
Text in English and French, on inverted pages.
ISBN 2-89261-460-0 (French distribution)
ISBN 1-894852-21-4 (English distribution)
I. Spencer, Nigel, 1945- . II. Title. III. Title: Frissons d’enfants. IV. Title:
Frissons d’enfants. English.
PS8576.I26F74 2006 C843’.54 C2006-940255-8E
PS9576.I26F74 2006
Legal Deposit: First quarter 2006
Library and Archives Canada
Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec
XYZ Publishing acknowledges the financial support of our publishing program by the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP) of the Department of Canadian Heritage, The Canada Council for the Arts, the ministere de la Culture et des Communications du Québec, and the Société de développement des entreprises culturelles.
Layout: Édiscript enr.
Cover design: Zirval Design
Author photograph: Steve McCormack
Cover art: Annouchka Galouchko, Haunted Childhoods, 2006
Printed and bound in Canada at HLN, Sherbrooke (Québec).
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This Silence of Mine
“You’re not listening, now, are you” my teacher scolded, “Now, what exactly are you thinking about?”
I was far off, somewhere else...
For three days, my big sister had done everything imaginable. She’d cried and shouted and shrieked, for her fiancé was well and truly dead. She no longer had enough energy left to tremble any more. She’d taken off her engagement ring and placed it in its little box that made a dry snap when she closed it. A crack, a pistol shot to the heart of my childhood. That was my first death, and I buried it in the deepest part of my memory.
Like her fiancé, pierced to the heart by a drill deep in the mine. Pierced through and through...
A gaping hole, deep down in the guts, in the heart, in the centre of the earth where they slide coffins.
A gulf, a space closed forever like the eyelids of death.
A sudden disappearance, predestined.
The child I was had stopped listening.
My sister’s fiancé had a dark beauty, a mirror-soul where all could spy their own secrets, their most rapturous dreams. He gave me permission to be alive. And more than that. To him, I was necessary, a little girl whose need for love made her adorable. Needed and needy. And he fulfilled those needs. I worshipped him.
His absence began to invade me, to pierce through my consciousness. I was perturbed, talked without stopping to resist the death that drew me towards it. To fight the silence and paralysis that defined it to my child’s mind.
“Are you through fidgeting? Go on up to the board and write the letter ‘O’!”
I faced the board and wrote nothing.
“Did you hear what I said?”
“Yes, Miss, I did. Can’t you see it? I wrote a letter to silence, and it fell into something like a black hole. We can’t see in the dark, but the letter’s there just the same!”
“What on earth are you talking about?