Below, the street was gleefully sharpening its knives.—Why them? How do you determine the difference?Why don’t you give the order to pause this slaughter before it spreads?—It’s because we’ve mastered the art of gesture; they,since the dawn of time, content themselves with movement.Come what may. As for me, I wash my hands of the whole thing. A consummate actor, he turned words into action. The first howl erupted—one that would curdle your blood—followed by cries of rage. Through the windowpane,you saw the blades begin to slash, methodically, and a few bodiesdance grotesquely before they collapsed. Which was to be demonstrated, no doubt.
Genocide
Sylvie Kandé
Translated from the French by Nancy Naomi Carson
Feature Date
Series
- Translation
Selected By
Share This Poem
Print This Poem
“Genocide” from GESTUARY: by Sylvie Kandé.
Published by Seagull Books on February 13, 2026.
English Translation Copyright © 2026 by Nancy Naomi Carson.
All rights reserved.
Reproduced by Poetry Daily with permission.
Sylvie Kandé is the author of three collections of poetry published by Gallimard. Gestuaire (2016) received the 2017 Prix Louise Labé, and is anthologized in German as Stiller Tausch (Lyrik Kabinett by Hanser 2023). Its English version is published as Gestuary (Seagull, 2026). La quête infinie de l’autre rive: épopée en trois chants (2011) received the 2017 Prix Lucienne Gracia-Vincent under the auspices of Fondation Saint John Perse and is now published in German by Matthes & Seitz, and in English by Wesleyan U. Press as The Neverending Quest for the Other Shore. An Epic in Three Cantos (2022). Lagon, lagunes. Tableau de Mémoire (2000) was postfaced by Edouard Glissant. She is a faculty of honor and a full member of the International Academy Léopold Sédar Senghor.
Photo:
Richard Weinroth
Richard Weinroth
Nancy Naomi Carson was awarded the 2022 Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Prize. Author of seventeen titles (including twelve translations), her poetry and translations have been noted in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Ms. Magazine. A recipient of two translation grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and decorated by the French government with the Academic Palms, her work has been shortlisted for the Sarah Maguire Translation Prize and the Best Translated Book Award. Carlson is the translations editor for On the Seawall, the co-translations editor for Pleiades, and is co-chair of PEN America’s Translation Committee.
A richly imagined, physically charged poetry collection in which history, myth, and protest are transformed into lyrical gestures.
Sylvie Kandé’s Gestuary offers a collection of gestures—of death and life, of tenderness and brutality—that fractures the flow of time. Senegalese riflemen from World War I are juxtaposed with migrants at borders who sew their lips shut in protest over immigration policies. In dream-like sequences, the dead refuse to stay underground and "push against the fence / that swings between our realm and theirs." Inspired by unexpected sources, including jazz, sculpture, the legacy of the slave trade, proverbs, and elements of Diola culture, Kandé’s poems are rich in musicality and sophisticated syntax, rendered into a lyrical and luminous English by Nancy Naomi Carlson.
Poetry Daily Depends on You
With your support, we make reading the best contemporary poetry a treasured daily experience. Consider a contribution today.
