Behind the large eyes the curved lips the curls
in relief on the gold cover of our being
a dark spot which travels like the fish
seen in the dawn-like quiet of the sea:
a void everywhere with us.
And the bird which flew away last winter
with a broken wing
the shelter of life,
and the young woman who left to play
with the dogteeth of summer
and the soul which sought the lower world chirping
and the country like a large plane-leaf swept along by the torrent
of the sun
with the ancient monuments and contemporary sorrOw.
And the poet lingers, looking at the stones, and asks himself
does there exist
among these ruined lines, edges, points, hollows, and curves
does there exist
here where one meets the path of the rain, the wind, and ruin
does there exist the movement of the face, shape of the tenderness
of those who diminished so strangely in our lives
those who remained the shadow of waves and thoughts
in the boundlessness of the sea
or perhaps no, nothing remains but the weight
the nostalgia of the weight of a living being
there where we now live unsubstantially, bending
like the branches of a miserable willow-tree heaped in the duration
of despair
while the yellow current slowly carries rushes uprooted in the mud
image of a face turned to marble with the decision of an eternal
bitterness.
The poet a void.
Shieldbearer, the sun climbed warring,
and from the depths of the cave a frightened bat
hit the light like an arrow on a shield:
