A note about the work “Excerpts from Skyside” from Stéphanie Ferrat translated by Marissa Davis for the Michigan Quarterly Review's Fall 2024 Translation Issue: I stumbled upon Skyside at a poetry fair in Paris several years ago, and it captivated me from the first page. As a painter as well as a poet, Ferrat imbues her work with meditations on the creative process, touching on both the miracles and the banalities (and the miracles within the banalities) of artmaking. Her language is often tinged with the surrealist, leaping from subject to subject in a kind of textual collage–a challenge, but also a thrill, for me as a translator. Skyside's fearless experimentation, philosophical contemplation, and camaraderie with the natural world sing to me with every read.