"not to worry:
you had your birth
given you / you
will be
given your death ---
in between
keep moving."
-- Pierre Joris (July 14, 1946 - February 27, 2025)
We were deeply saddened to learn from Nicole Peyrafitte that her husband, Pierre Joris, the acclaimed poet and translator, passed away earlier today.
Pierre taught poetry and poetics at the University at Albany from 1992 to 2012.
A prolific author, editor, and translator of more than 60 books, he was one of the foremost translators of avant-garde poetry into both French and English. Among his many significant contributions, he translated several works of the Romanian-born French poet and Holocaust survivor, Paul Celan.
His other translations include books by Pablo Picasso, Maurice Blanchot, Edmond Jabès, Habib Tengour, Kurt Schwitters and Michel Bulteau into English, and by Carl Solomon, Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, Gregory Corso, Pete Townsend, Julian Beck and Sam Shepard into French.
In her message, Nicole wrote:
"We will gather at main gate, Greenwood Cemetery, 500 25th Street (Fifth Avenue and 25th Street, Brooklyn), on Friday, February 28 at 9:45am and proceed to the gravesite. At 2pm, we will meet at Sunny’s Bar in Red Hook (253 Conover Street, Brooklyn)."
Exactly one month ago, on the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, Pierre wrote his last Instagram post:
"Today is the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau — where between 1940 & 1945, of the 1.3 million people sent there, 1.1 million were murdered.
Here is my translation of Paul Celan’s “Todesfuge,” the first (& still the major) poem about the death camps, and the one recording we have of Celan reading the poem." (Listen here)
Deathfugue
Black milk of morning we drink you evenings
we drink you at noon and mornings we drink you at night
we drink and we drink
A man lives in the house he plays with the snakes he writes
he writes when it darkens to Deutschland your golden hair Margarete
he writes and steps in front of his house and the stars glisten and he whistles his dogs to come
he whistles his jews to appear let a grave be dug in the earth
he commands us play up for the dance
Black milk of dawn we drink you at night
we drink you mornings and noontime we drink you evenings
we drink and we drink
A man lives in the house he plays with the snakes he writes
he writes when it turns dark to Deutschland your golden hair Margarete
Your ashen hair Shulamit we dig a grave in the air there one lies at ease
He calls jab deeper into the earth you there and you other men sing and play
he grabs the gun in his belt he draws it his eyes are blue
jab deeper your spades you there and you other men continue to play for the dance
Black milk of dawn we drink you at night
we drink you at noon we drink you evenings
we drink you and drink
a man lives in the house your golden hair Margarete
your ashen hair Shulamit he plays with the snakes
He calls out play death more sweetly death is a master from Deutschland
he calls scrape those fiddles more darkly then as smoke you’ll rise in the air
then you’ll have a grave in the clouds there you’ll lie at ease
Black milk of dawn we drink you at night
we drink you at noon death is a master from Deutschland
we drink you evenings and mornings we drink and drink
death is a master from Deutschland his eye is blue
he strikes you with lead bullets his aim is true
a man lives in the house your golden hair Margarete
he sets his dogs on us he gifts us a grave in the air
he plays with the snakes and dreams death is a master from Deutschland
your golden hair Margarete
your ashen hair Shulamit
Copyright © 2020 by Pierre Joris. From Memory Rose into Threshold Speech: The Collected Earlier Poetry (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2020) by Paul Celan, translated by Pierre Joris.
Videos from our most recent events with Pierre Joris.