BROWSE Columns
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I am speaking
to a snail,
whose shell
echoes the lines
of your sombre brow.
nearby there is a
swollen nightingale,
a sorcerer
who sings,
piercing
my ears,
delighting
the pack of wolves,
vandalising the conversation.
is it seeking to cling
to the colossal echo
of my sorrow?
the snail
slides swiftly,
hungry
and covered
in a layer of lime.
moving away,
I think it seeks
the sweet river of embers
that once surrounded
the weeping willow.
there is no such thing as the passing of time,
there is no such things as the imposed pain,
neither are you
nor am I,
just a faint
memory,
a daffodil
and a pitiful dagger
of your feathers.
a weeping that returns
to the beginning:
ironically,
I see only a bed,
your remains on the sheets
and the plague.
deadly painting
of a pagan dance.
I think the snail
only felt
my heavy flight,
and mistook
the nightingale’s psalm
for my weeping
without hearing
my cry of emotion.
can you see me?
tell me
I’m not alone
please.
a mirror:
a cypress
purple and
silent;
an epitaph
with a signature
in ruins;
an epiphany,
a savoury image
of a body
in culmination;
a bowl of fruit,
a convulsion of colour,
the sticky countenance
of a union;
a clock
showing the hour
of your farewell.
I don’t know why
but I wait.
I wait and wait,
the snail has vanished
I think it sank
into the sky,
the promised land
dry and barren:
profane diamonds
so blue,
so happy.
the nightingale took its leave
with a final roar
in search
of spring,
of a mate,
of its former countenance;
it was of no use to it
the robe I fashioned,
with my feathers
most vivid,
most striking,
with the spilled blood
that conceived them.
I keep waiting,
I suppose
hopeful.
I’m not quite sure of what.
or perhaps I know very well,
and it frightens me
because
there is no one ahead,
yet I cannot move forward.
another waiting room
filled with windows
facing the scorching
sun,
yet there is no warmth,
not even a comforting embrace.
sunflower seeds
fading
in the mist,
which prevents
us from distinguishing
north from south.
and then
the greenish train
at this station
didn’t stop,
it went on and on
with no apparent destination.
how did my friend the nightingale
ever reach
his beloved,
without a coat,
without a compass?
my body weeps
with pain,
with virulent spots
growing inside me.
the blizzard explains to me:
your abdomen is a canvas
of pure expression.
but I see my skin,
with hairs standing on end
and mined trenches,
still seeking
your warmth,
with time
dripping away
through those holes,
with no hope of holding it back.
I see it
clearly.
I am dying
of pain.
and your merciful God
sees it without compassion.
A stretcher of thorns,
the rotten fragrance
of passion fruit,
a peaceful dream,
a point of eternal illusion,
an aphrodisiac placebo
better than facing
the corroded sanctuary,
the broken ritual,
my lost self.
if you are here
in the queue,
you see my pain
and there is not a hint of
the scent of your forgiveness
why do I wait
for that forgiveness?
a shadow,
which I cannot distinguish
from the walls
devoid of life
and from the chairs
waiting without
a beloved soul,
tinkles in my ear
as you used to
do.
it whispers to me
like a cat
and fills
a little,
just a little,
the empty space
of my heart.
it is definitely
you speaking to me.
it is your ghost;
proof
that you are still here?
through the window
I see a trail
of feathers
that weep
in the hammock,
in the sap
of the weeping willow,
stuck to that
old scarf,
which once
I took to you,
and they remind me
that perhaps
not hearing your song
is for the best.
I bid you farewell,
Icarus,
your wings flew
and drifted away
down that lost river.
fly high,
high and far.
I bid you farewell,
sitting in this
waiting room,
with ghosts,
a half-knitted jumper,
and without a functioning
heart.
Translated from Spanish by Eponine Howarth.
***
note from the author: prologue
will I ever face reinvention?
will I ever try and explore my different versions:
my hidden emotions,
and all of my what ifs.
will I ever find a feeling as strong as my self-infliction?
will I find myself in the midst of my crucifixion?
save my guts before it's too late
or down the lane will I stay unchanged?
there’s love even when there’s not
there’s space for it all,
even for the most crude winter
and the tenderness of a lost heart who lingers,
the deciphering of this crippling mind
looking for an answer in the past.
drunk on a tarnishing scenario
praying ‘please let me find love at last’.
II
your prickling hands
a phantasmagoric con
strings attached to my soul
my suffering heart as
big as your cold claws
letting loose in the clasp of your tight void
tying me up in invisible gauze
fighting in fictitious wars
winning a prize I knew I couldn't even own
your strong hold, guarding my quarrel
as the moon leading a current
clashing in the shores as an
unpromised hoax.
the seaside makes a rewinding noise,
the void speaking your hollow words:
those unfaithful heavenly vows
piloting my heart back to the fall
and back to your locked hold.
