Secret Agent: A
Riddle[1]
‘Un seul verre d’eau illumine le monde.’
(Jean Cocteau, Orphee)
This bright Bacchante,
Offspring of Orpheus,
Mourning her mother,
Hurled back to Hades
For Pluto’s pleasure,
And ill-fated father,
Luckless in love,
Émigré orphan,
Ripe for revenge,
Trained in tradecraft,
Rapping in riddles,
In cunning codes,
Turns agile agent
For rightist rebels
On insolvent islands
Lost to the left.
‘Les chimeres sont
enrhumees.’
Crossing the causeway
At Corpus Callosum,
She’s seen with suspicion,
Tagged and then tailed.
Chained at the checkpoint,
No papers or passport,
Pummelled by police,
Stays silent and sly.
Threatened with theories,
Jolted with jargon.
Drilled in defiance,
Concealing her codes,
Leaps into the lake,
Cresting the combers,
Braving the bullets
Of thuggish theorists.
Frantic for freedom
She’ll never submit,
‘Les grenouilles
volent a la Tour d’Ivoire
Safely ashore,
Shivering and sodden,
Huddling in hovels,
Seeking survival,
She crouches at corners,
Making her music,
Singing her songs,
Unhappy harlot
Longing for love.
Who stops to listen
To her soulful singing,
In sunless cities
Of barren buildings,
Where trees are trimmed
To angular aspects,
And uniformed oafs,
With frowning faces,
Draft endless edicts
On Logic and Law?
‘Le temps va plus vite
en reculant.’
Home in her hideout,
Nameless at nightfall,
She sends strange secrets
Back to her base.
Death, dark despatcher,
Issues Her orders,
All are obeyed.
Motorbike minions,
All lithe in leather,
Hurtling hell’s angels,
Sinister centaurs,
Fell in their force,
Break through the barriers,
Gun down the guards,
Rescue the rebel,
Bring her back home.
‘L’oiseau chant aves
ses doigts.’
[1] See Jean
Cocteau’s great film, Orphee, which
inspired this poem. The lines in French were coded messages sent to French
Resistance groups during WWII.
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