PREVERT'S "PAROLES"

It is not difficult to imagine the poetry of Jacques Prevert scribbled on a napkin, or paper tablecloth, and abandoned in some Paris cafe.

This romantic notion has unfortunately led to Prevert being labeled as a 'surrealist clown' by many of his fellow poets, and his harshest critics. No doubt, a fine line exists between sentiment and sentimentality, and much of his poetry has suffered badly from atrocious translations and a rather trivial selection of work chosen for publication in anthologies and textbooks. Still, Prevert's observations on the human condition remain astute, and his poetic voice certainly speaks for our times.

Seven hundred thousand copies of 'Paroles' were printed when the collection was first released after World War II; the collection was a great success, and indeed had a huge impact on French youth at the time. Written during the French Occupation, 'Paroles' literally translates to 'words' in English - yet there is no question that the title is a double entrendre for 'passwords', which it also refers to in French.

At his best, Prevert simply shows his reader something and lets them draw their own conclusion; at his worst, he draws these pictures himself, often with too maudlin a touch, beginning beautifully with what the eye sees, before becoming unnecessarily cliched.

Born in 1900, Prevert left school to go and work at Le Bon Marche department store in Paris, before he was enlisted into military service in 1918.

He wrote numerous collections of poetry, along with many screenplays, his most famous being the 1945 film "Les Enfants du Paradis" ("The Children of Paradise"), which he collaborated with director Marcel Carne.

His cinematic eye never veered far from his poetry, and Prevert's oeuvre remains as alive and relevant today as it was over 50 years ago, when it was first written, scribbled on a napkin in  some Paris cafe.

L'EMPIRE DE LA MORT

Twenty metres beneath the streets of Paris, far below the rattling Metro, lay the Catacombs.

One descends 130 steps down a narrow, spiral stairwell into silence and darkness; aside from the occasional noisy tourist, the only sound to be heard is the gentle gurgling of some unknown aqueduct, no doubt channelling sources away from the area.

The Paris Catacombs were created at the end of the 18th century, when sanitary conditions at the Saints-Innocents cemetery at Les Halles became unbearable. After a tireless search, the French government decided upon an abandoned stone quarry, at Denfert-Rochereau, the original gates of the city, just south of the centre.

On 7th April, 1786, a procession of chanting priests led a parade of black-covered, bone-laden, horse-drawn wagons through the deserted streets of Paris, bearing the remains of more than six million deceased Parisians to their new resting place at the ossuary. The only exception were those who were killed during the French Revolution a few years later, whose bodies are the only remains to have been buried directly in the catacombs.

There, the bones were thrown into the corridors and left; it wasn't until 1810, that the then ossuary inspector, Hericart de Thury, decided to create a facade of neatly piled skulls and tibias, behind which the remaining bones were left in a heap.

The catacombs have remained a unique, though morbid, tourist attraction since the middle of the 19th century. And there is no question why.

Once at the bottom, visitors follow a winding hallway of mortared stone, which leads to a series of sculptures, most of them of the mines before they were an ossuary. There is also a replica of the fortress at Port-Mahon, the largest town on the island of Minorca, which is extremely impressive; it had been sculptured by a quarryman named Decure, who was believed to have been held prisoner at the fortress by the English.

Another stretch of dark, twisting hallways, and you reach the entrance to the ossuary, a narrow door graced with the inscription

"Arrete, c'est ici l'empire de la mort"

(literally, "Stop, this is the empire of death").

Quietly walking through the maze of halls and caverns, one can't help but feel both amazed and saddened by the carefully placed bones, many of which are almost artistic in the way they have been left. A barrel-shaped array of skulls, which hide a pillar supporting the ceiling, in the 'Crypt of the Passion', is particularly astonishing. And amid all these deathly sculptures are numerous reflections on the fragility of human life, carved attentively into the stonewall.

Also intriguing are the rusty gates, which block many dark passages leading to 'invisible' corners of the catacombs - many of them remain un-renovated, or are simply un-navigable for regular tourists.

At the end of the two-kilometre walk through the catacombs, and up the 83 steps to street level, one can't help but feel grateful to be returned to the world of the living.

PARIS

Last night

I walked along 

the Left Bank

listening 

to the Seine

quietly breathing

like two lovers

only the lights

of Paris

lit the sky

all the stars

were gone,

for you 

had stolen them all

and put them 

in my eyes

so I might find my way

along the Left Bank,

along the river,

home 

to you

And all I could think about

was 

us...