Hands in the Grave XXX by Santiago Vizcaíno Translated by Alexis Levitin
I exist,
I people the night with birches.
I drink from this interminable rosary,
lean my arm on frightened carob beans.
A universe aswarm with prickly species.
“You are a fearsome mummy,” I tell myself.
You ought to dig a grave and bury yourself,
taking along your smell and your tongue.
Hands in the Grave XXXI by Santiago Vizcaíno Translated by Alexis Levitin
“No,” I say,
death is an ugly child
who vomits saffron flowers.
No.
I don’t have to calm the itching of my voice.
I don’t have to embrace the hanged man’s rope.
I don’t have to go through the wall.
I could forget it all,
and yet am moved by the hunger of the desert.
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