I see the mirror, the other shore, the forbidden territory and its oblivion, as expressing in your work the fear of “being two,” an idea that transcends the definition of doppelgänger and includes every person you were.
You put it nicely, it’s the fear of all the selves struggling inside me. There is a poem by Michaux in which he writes: “Je suis; je parle à qui-je-fus et qui-je-fus me parlent . . . On n’est pas seul dans sa peau.”
Does it show up in any particular moment?
When my child’s voice betrays me.
According to one of your poems, your most perfect love was your love for the mirror. Who do you see in it?
The other that I am. (The truth is that I’ve got a certain fear of mirrors.) Occasionally we come together. Almost always when I write.
One night at the circus “in the moment that the horsemen with torches in hand were galloping in fierce circles around their black cage” you recovered “a lost language.” What is that thing that is “for my heart like the hot sound of hooves against sand?”
That’s the undiscovered language I’d like to find.
To read the entire interview with Alejandra Pizarnik, purchase your copy of Music & Literature no. 6. . .