So stubborn of you
not to appear, be so aloof.
Prince of long holidays—
body a jet of blood,
a ship of rage
and restlessness.
Loving absence, is that you?
Step on water, the path runs dark.
Son of phosphorent fate,
I am powdered ash,
floating, sinking—
never forgetting you.
Just get out and run you a mile —
That possibility hangs heavy
over a quiet street and a flyover, blue tarpaulin
above shanties on the tar banks.
The morning is mist, the era of road repair,
orthogonal routes to far-flung stops;
the city’s breed of transport
softly collapsing on pilfered ground.
Not to startle: tiptoeing —
with vim, without vim —
a motion made to seem like stillness.
Rest. Arrest. Breathe.
How will they know you are a good man?
They won’t. That’s the point.
How will they know you were here?
Who cares? Nobody profits from that useless fact.
Why are you here then?
Fate. This burden had to be carried somewhere.
Then they raised a diaphanous screen
in front of the dying man,
separating him from the others.
He could still see through the film,
but they were only moving shadows:
wan figures trudging along
in broken, abrupt gaits —
like one who walks
bouncing a colic-screaming baby.
When they touched his skin,
their hands were tight
in transparent gloves,
warding off the faint germs
of his impending death.
Yet he was glad to be there.
A condemned man is still a living man.
But the exhaustion — God!
Pain arrived as long pikes.
Like some stubborn child
refusing sleep,
he hung on by a thinning thread.
And the relatives,
they were on the edge:
fed, cleaned, and watched over the man,
but they also wanted him to go —
as only the living can:
fussing over and failing
him at the same time.
I know you as the shadow
knows its flesh.
In evidence, the object —
a lingering state.
If light is a permanent thing,
if love is?
Lie on the ground, squander
yourself,
as darkness wears darkness —
such is its autonomy.
If longing is a permanent thing,
if silence —
Should we grieve each other?
We’re both still alive.
Our sadness feeds on bitter fumes,
and memories ride a red bus.
Are you leaving?
My peace of mind takes the window seat.
What little’s left
belongs to neither you nor me.
I’ll give this misery another name.
Please — give me back mine.
Keep your grievance, and my forgetting —
but travel on a red bus.
This forgetting, too, is a long halt.
Let’s stretch our legs awhile.
Let’s imagine we never loved each other:
just rode together on the red bus.
A splotch of the sun’s yolk. An azure maze of sky.
Flower to fruit. Seed to vine.
Silently everything blooms,
silently everything dies.
Tracing the immortal road —
who knows how far off rest is?
The sun doesn’t know.
The sunflower doesn’t.
But he, playing hide-and-seek
with himself, looks to the horizon,
sees someone coming,
not knowing who it is.
He won’t hazard a guess.
Won’t ask, Who are you, emptying my days —
folding one moment into a moment less,
raking the dry leaves of time?
I’ll wait in my garden, gather blind fruits
in the shadow of ridged bark,
bearing the palpitant heart
of the south wind.
I’ll keep watch
(an eager house cat)
listening to the lust song of a parakeet.
I’ll echo that song.
But the stranger says, Remember
this garden, this day —
How we were lost, and will be again
when light leans on red pots
of summer: guavas ripen,
pomegranates swell with heat.
The bland taste of dust
on the old tongue of rain.
Then, through barely lit autumn,
the shiver of winter —
a pale ghost
of moonlight
on this tired bench.
When we outlast
the seasons,
but forget our names.
If there is a God, He’d better be a friendly man.
On the starry benches of the sky,
He and I sit side by side in our high boots,
cigars in hand, gazing down at Earth,
nodding in quiet agreement.
“Full of life. Full of life — that plucky little planet.
But life… ah, so troublesome. God!”
Imagine a line breaking out from your past —
ripping through your back,
passing through you,
exiting ahead to meet the future.
Imagine it as the beam of a laser,
the trace of a bullet,
an X-ray
penetrating flesh.
Whatever it is —
you will not survive this wound.
