The Stroller of Monmartre, Parts I and II
by Reed Venrick
Heading down a side street
In hilly Montmartre, after
A rainy afternoon, steam
Rising from the cobblestones
Below, Mansard roofs above,
No cars or vehicles here
Just bicycles on a curving,
Slanting-wise side street,
A street built in that narrow
Winding style that’s seen
A thousand years of foot-
Steps of people who pass
Me without glances—strangers
And ghosts, to each other,
Passing “the other,” “L’autre,”
As Sartre wrote in a play.
We “promenade” along,
Some wear shirts and
some wear skirts, some
Wear jeans, some, shorts,
Some carry backpacks, some
Shopping bags—Carrefour or
Aldi—one humped, elderly man
Crosses himself, while facing
A church with cut lime-stones,
Aged as condensed silt
From the Seine River along this
“Petit rue,” where generations
Have walked with families and
Children and dogs a thousand
Years or two. We flow in a weight
Less, invisible river of the mind,
Floating among these strangers
To each other, we are fish
Swimming in slow motion, our
Legs are fins, moving slowly—
A woman pouring water into
A ceramic bowl for her brown
Beagle puppy dog, and
Rising behind her an aged,
A gargantuan, church door,
Dark walnut, so ancient, it rots
On the underside—boot
Prints stamped on the wood,
Remains of Caesar’s soldiers
And Hitler’s troops kicking in?
She turns her faded blonde
Head toward me, as I pet her
Puppy dog but she gazes
Too long, as if she knows
Me—maybe she recognizes
One ghost to the other—
So, I ask—“Which way
To the Cathedral of Notre Dame?”
She flicks her eyes—replies “gauche.”
We converse for a minute
And then we’re off to our own
Little island cloud in the sky,
When in every generation, our
Bodies return, the man
Holding hands of a tottering child,
The woman pushing a baby
Stroller, the “fromagerie” selling *1
Cheese, which I inhale, and
The people slowly meeting me
And passing by, carrying dripping
Umbrellas and bulky backpacks,
And a teen girl lapping me past,
Leaving her cigarette stink
Lingering on, she’s looking
Pregnant, she’s wearing a Levi-jean
Jacket over a bulging black dress
In that quaint postmodern dress
That Parisian girls imitate, they’
Are shedding off the skin of their
Of their ‘lycée” school uniform,
I approach a backpacker with long
Hair and a sweaty “Far North”
Backpack, he pauses to learn
Over a low wall, he’s taking a picture
Of “Cimetiere de Montmartre,”
With it’s mossy, medieval stones,
And I pause to ask—“Do you know
The way to Notre Dame?” He says
Without looking around,
“J’y suis alle une fois—I went there once.”
I dawdle on, I pass a restaurant’s
Sign that reads “Plat du jour,”
And I sit, but when I see the plate
Of the day is horsemeat, I stand up.
PART TWO
And I stroll on along, but
It’s too late for lunch anyway
And too early for dinner, I pass
A kiosk selling tourist postcards
And French newspapers
On a corner and next door
I pause before a teen boy cleaning
The window glass of a store
Selling books with a poster foregrounding
L’etranger, by Albert Camus
When I ask “As-tu lu ce livre?” *2
He doesn’t answer, probably thinks
I’m an immigrant, probably doesn’t
Understand my French—strangers
And ghosts to each other. But
As I stroll on, I’m asking, is it not
Astonishing that some dead live
On in the abstraction of words?
As I wander on past the men and
Women, and children and dogs
With infinite faces—some
With frowns and some with smiles,
And some with no expression at all—
Like passing a flight attendant
With her elegant, powdered nose
And Svelte shape of Eva Green wearing
A formal blue uniform, she’s
Pulling a roller bag over noisy
Cobblestones, past a child
In a stroller, reaching out to pet
A passerby’s pomeranian dog,
And I turn the corner past a queue
Standing patiently before
An aromatic, pastry shop that
Specializes in “chocalatines,” *3
But I have another idea, so I wander
On until I come to outdoor tables
Before a “patisserie,” overlooking the Seine *4
River with the Cathedral of Notre
Dame on the horizon, where
It flows around the island, here
Round tables, maple wood under
Shade of a plane tree, where I order
An expresso “un double, s’il
Vous plait,” from a waiter, to whom
I say—they say the best croissants
Are made with butter from Normandy
And best raspberry [reserve from Alsace-
Lorraine, but the waiter with glasses
Just stares—seems to know French
No better than I, but no matter, I am
One who sits happily in company
Of strangers, and together we savor
The strong flavor of expresso coffee, “sans
Lait ni sucre,” while we watch another *5
Generation pass us by, but because
we drink “Le cafe” and smoke tobacco
Clouds of foggy, cloggy, misty, stinky cigarettes
In outdoor cafes that soon we can verify
What I thought we were to begin—
Apparitions drifting through this Paris life,
Smoking too many cigarettes again.
FOOTNOTES:
1. A cheese shop
2. “Have you read that book?”
3. A chocolate-filled pastry.
4. A shop selling pastries
5. Without milk or sugar
BIO: Reed Venrick resides in France, mostly in Aix-en-Provence in sight of Paul Cezzane's last home.