Homero Aridjis

Translated by W. S. Merwin


Sometimes we touch a body

Sometimes we touch a body and we wake it
and it is a way through the night which opens
to our senses the pulsing of its arms like the sea's

and we love it like the sea
like a naked song
like the only Summer

We say it is light as one says now
we say it is yesterday and other places

we fill it with bodies and bodies
with gulls our own gulls

We go climbing it peak after peak
with ears and roofs and door latches

with hotels and ditches and memories
and landscapes and time and asteroids

We fill it to the brim with ourselves and with soul
with collars of islands and with soul

We feel ourselves living and everyday
we feel ourselves beautiful but shadow

Karin Rosenthal


It’s your name and it's also October

It's your name and it's also October
it's the bed and your ointments
it's she you the young woman whose head's in a whirl
and they're the doves flying in secret
and the last step of the tower
and it's the beloved spying love from the battlements
and it's the consent in each movement and the objects
and they're the pavilions
and the not-being of the all in one act
and it's the Song of Songs
and it's the love that loves you
and it's a sum of watching
of vigilance alone at the edge of the night
at the side of the dreamer and of those who are sleepless
and it's also April and November
and the inner turmoils of August
and it's your nakedness
which the light of the mirrors drinks in
and it's the way you and the wheat have
of showing yourselves in things
and you're you and I'm I
and it's a going around in a circle
to give what you do the dimension of a bow
and alone with your impulse tell you the word


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