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¿Puedo aclarar?

Quizá no puedas armar silencio con palabras, pero he aquí luz hecha de sombras. No es como las ojeras alrededor de sus iris azules. No es como la sed que me asegura que cuando la haya saciado, el mundo entero dejará de ser un lugar tan árido. No es la noche sobre esa sierra hace dos semanas que, habiendo echado la luna, nos mostró desde un cielo muerto y turbio la Pequeña Nube de Magallanes. (Una de las únicas dos galaxias ajenas visibles desde la tierra, ¿viste?) Tampoco es la mugre escurriéndose por el desagüe, ni la cara detrás de la máscara, las cenizas ante el fuego. Ni las sombras estampadas en la calle alrededor del farol en la lluvia.

Hay multitudes y trato de contarles todo. Aunque me presten atención, pocos entienden inglés y menos castellano. Mi novia traduce a turco.

[Escrito con unas palabras de Alejandra Pizarnik]

Antes de la revolución

En la mañana, un hombre calvo se me acerca,
sus orejas poniéndose rojo en los copos de nieve.
Criaturas de aire frío están formadas de su aliento.
“Pienso que te has olvidado de algo,” dice.
Naturalmente, me he olvidado a mansalva,
me he olvidado de sierras y rascacielos,
me he olvidado de heridas y duelos,
y entonces no respondo.
“Hay alguien con que quiero que se encuentre,” dice.
Me lleva a una plaza de bancos desiertos,
una plaza de sol severo y blanco.
Me lleva a una estatua de cinco metros bruscos, y pregunta,
“¿Por qué hay una estatua con tu cara?”
El problema: es fácil levantar una estatua,
pero se necesita una guerra, golpe, o revolución para derribarlo.
“¿Estás responsable por esta anomalía?” pregunta.
Me acerco a la piedra; raspo suavemente con mis uñas a sus pies.
Los ojos de la estatua miran arriba, ignorándome.
Quizás me recuerdo haciéndola:
quería ser una sierra, una rascacielos,
quería ser el río y el puente,
quería ser la espada y el tridente.
La carne piedra es más fuerte que la de cada otra persona.
Quizás me recuerdo haciéndola.
“¿Salió bien, eso plan?” pregunta.
“No,” digo. “No necesité una estatua.
Necesité una caja de chocolates.”
“Solo tengo este naranja,” él dice.
“Gracias.”

warm right here

i’m about to go to bed and she tells me
“write a fucking poem” but
i cry “it’s snowing outside,
the lamppost is being driven into the ground,
the cars are sleeping with empty faces,
the road is an endless feather bed.
write a fucking poem?”
i don’t know what it means that
the kid in my creative writing class
with the sam adams hat and stubble
got crushed by the tram in the middle of the road.
“what do you want me to do?” i scream.
“i was thrown out of the wheelchair and broke
my leg for the second damn time.
i can fly so why can’t i walk,
what am i waiting for?”
lights off, the monitor is white blaring blazing.
you know, i was half under the covers when she tells me
“write a fucking poem” but
i cry “it’s snowing outside,
and warm right here.
you’re a voice in my head;
it’s not my problem!”

Cajun Shrimp

Rain still slicks your face while
Philadelphia colors receding clouds
a mellow urban purple,
and puddles on the road glow ragged
ginger in the street lamps.
Alternating lights of the PED XING sign
throw our shadows back and forth.
Far-off headlights sweep across the wilting.

You off into the dorm and I quest for ice cream,
but I’m not quite sure where I’m going, and, worse,
I don’t know which flavor is our favorite.
My snow-crunching footsteps seem to precede me,
and I find tiny, overwrought poems in ice cream names.
We might die, but “Black Fudge Overdose” sounds delightful.

Room reorganized while I was out:
you’ve made a cocoon between bed and wall
with mattress on the floor;
white sheets ceiling held up by thumb tacks.
The moved bed exposes that colorful stash of bottles,
and your sobriety is in question.
Cajun shrimp is the best color, you’ve decided.
You walk with a beautiful stagger,
see pink when you close your eyes.

There we were in the middle of the room,
your hair swaying above me.

Radius

The blood was minimal, only just a foot or two to the windshield,
and I am sure splinters of bark were spread
no more than ten feet in any direction.
Perhaps shards of glass were sent out even farther,
shrapnel twenty, thirty feet through the air.
They say nothing travels faster than bad news;
well, nothing travels as far, either,
and so this range is always increasing.
Dinner table chatter, “did you hear?”s,
letters sent out to relatives, friends.
And everywhere I walk I bring it with me
carrying pieces of the wreckage
tucked away in the folds of my clothing
and in between the pages of this book.

But back at the center,
something that had yet to move at all:
a small bouquet of flowers
stapled to that still standing, shattered tree.
It was several years before one night’s wind
gently let it, browned, withered, and shriveled, to the ground.