The moment, the tennis player serves masterfully

his bullet, he possesses total animal innocence;

the moment,

the philosopher surprises a new truth,

he's a complete beast.

Anatole France affirms

that religious sentiment

is the function of a special organ in the human body,

until now, unknown, and it's possible

to say that, then,

at the exact moment such an organ

entirely functions

the believer is so free of malice,

he could be said to be a vegetable.

Oh soul! Oh thought! Oh Marx! Oh Feuerbach!

***

In front of the French Comedy, there's the Cafe

Regency: in which there's a hidden

room with a orchestra seat and a table.

When I enter, the motionless dust is already rising.

Between my lips of rubber, the coal

of a cigarette smokes, and in the smoke can be seen

two intensive smokes, the thorax of the Cafe

and in the thorax, the profound oxide of sadness.

It's important that autumn graft into autumns,

it's important that autumn integrates to sprouts,

the cloud, to semesters; the cheekbones, to wrinkle.

It's important to smell like a postulating lunatic

how warm the snow is, how the turtle flies,

the how so simple, so fulminant the when!

***

Confidence in the eyeglass, not in the eye;

confidence in the staircase, not in the step;

in the wing, not in the bird,

and in yourself  alone, in yourself alone, in yourself alone.

Confidence in wickedness, not in the wicked;

in the glass, but never in the liquor;

in the corpse, but not in the man

and in yourself alone, in yourself alone, in yourself alone.

Confidence in many, but no longer in one;

in the river bed, never in the current;

in the trousers, not in the legs

and in yourself alone, in yourself alone, in yourself alone.

Confidence in the window, not in the door;

in the mother, not in the nine months;

in destiny, not in the golden dice,

and in yourself alone, in yourself alone, in yourself alone.

**********

A man passes by with bread on his shoulder.

Am I going to write, then, of my double?

Another sits down, scratches himself, extracts a louse from his armpit, kills it.

What use in speaking  of psychoanalysis?

Another has entered my chest with a stick in his hand.

To speak, then,  of Socrates to the doctor?

A cripple walks by, giving his arm to a child.

Am I going to read, then, Andre Breton?

Another shivers with cold, coughs, spits blood.

To play ever at alluding to the profound I?

Another searches in mud for bones, rinds.

How to write, then, of infinity?

A bricklayer falls from the roof, dies, no longer eats lunch.

To innovate, then, the trope, the metaphor?

A merchant steals a gram of weight from a client.

To speak, then, of the fourth dimension?

A banker falsfies his balance.

With what face to cry in the theatre?

A pariah sleeps with his foot to his back.

To speak, then, to anyone of Picasso?

Someone goes to a funeral sobbing.

How, then, to enter the Academy?

Someone cleans a rifle in his kitchen.

What use in speaking of the beyond?

Someone passes by, counting on his fingers.

How, then, to speak of the not-i without screaming?

*************

Stumble between two stars

There are people so wretched, that they don't have

even a body; quantitative hair,

below, in inches, the genial grief;

the way, on high;

don't look for me, molar of oblivion,

they seem to emerge from air, to add sighs mentally, to hear

light whips on their palates!

They leave the skin, scratching the sarcophagus in which they are born

and rise through death hour by hour

and fall, along their gelid alphabet, to the ground.

Aie of so much! aie of so little! aie for them!

Aie in my room, hearing them with lenses!

Aie in my throrax, when they buy suits!

Aie of my white dirt, in its combined dregs!

Beloved be the sanchez ears,

beloved those who sit down,

beloved the stranger and his wife,

the neighbor with sleeves, neck and eyes!

Beloved be the one who has bedbugs,

the one who wears a torn shoe in rain,

the one who keeps vigil over the corpse of bread with two matches,

the one who catches a finger in a door,

th one who doesn't have birthdays,

the one who lost his shadow in a fire,

the animal, the one who seems a parrot,

the one who seems a man, the poor rich,

the pure miserable the poor poor!

Beloved be

the one who is hungry or thirsty, but has no

hunger with which to satisfy his thirst,

no thirst with which to satisfy all his hungers!

Beloved be the one who works daily, nightly, hourly,

the one who sweats from pain or shame,

that one who goes, ordered by his hands, to the movies,

the one who pays with what he lacks,

the one who sleeps on his back,

the one who no longer recalls his childhood; beloved be

the bald one without a hat,

the just one without thorns,

the thief without roses,

the one who wears a watch and has seen God,

the one who has one honor and doesn't fail!

Beloved be the child, who falls and still cries,

and the man who has fallen and no longer cries!

Aie so much! Aie of so little! Aie for them!

***

Palms and guitar

Now, between us, here,

be with me, bring your body by the hand,

and let's have dinner together and  pass an instant of life

in two lives, giving a part to our death.

Now, come with yourself, do me the favor

of lamenting you in my name and in the light of teneblous night

where you bring your soul by the hand

and we flee ourselves on tiptoes.

Come to me, yes, and to you, yes,

even stepped, to see the two of us out of step,

marking the step of  good-bye.

Until we return! Until the turn!

Until we read, ignoramuses!

Until we return, let's say good-bye to ourselves!

What do the rifles matter to me,

listen to me;

listen to me, what does it matter to me,

if the bullet already circulates in the rank of my sign?

What do the bullets matter to you,

if the rifle is already smoking in your odor?

This very day, we will pass by

our star in the arms of the blind

and, once you sing to me, we will cry.

This very day, beautiful one, with your two step

and your trust where my fear will arrive,

we'll emerge from ourselves, two to two.

Until we are blind!

Until

we cry of so much returning!

Now,

between us, bring

your sweet person by the hand

and we'll have dinner together and pass an instant of life

in two lives, giving a part to our death.

Now, come with yourself, do me the favor

of singing something

and of playing in your soul, clapping hands.

Until we return! Until then!

Until we part, let's say good-bye to ourselves!

Alfonso: you're looking at me, I see,

from that implacable plane inhabited

by the linear always, the lineal nevers.

(That night, you slept, between your dream

and mine, on the rue de Riboute)

Palpably,

your inovidable half-breed hears you walk

in Paris, senses you silenced on the phone

and touches the wire of your last act

to test its weight, to toast

to the depths, to me, to you.

I still

buy (wine, milk, counting pennies)

under  my coat, so my soul won't see me,

under that coat, dear Alfonso,

and under the simple ray of my complex temple;

now I suffer, and you, no I, never, brother!

They told me in your centuries of pain,

beloved to be,

beloved to exist,

you made zeroes of wood. Is that true?

In the "drunk night" where you used to touch tangos,

touching your indignant creature, its heart,

escorted by you yourself, crying

for you yourself and for your heinous resemblance to your shadow,

Monsieur Fourgat, the patron, has grown old.

To tell him? To recount it to him? No more,

Alfonso; that, never again!

The hotel of Ecoles is still in business

and they still buy mandarin oranges

but I suffer, as I say to you,

sweetly, remembering

what we both suffered, to the death of both,

in the aperture of the double tomb,

of that other tomb with your to be

and this mahogany one with your to exist,

I suffer, drinking a glass of you, Silva,

a glass to put things right, as we used to say,

and afterwards, now we'll see what happens. .

It's this, the other toast, among three,

taciturn, diverse,

in wine, in world, in crystal, the one raised

more than once to body

and,  less than once, to thought.

Today is even more different;

today I suffer sweetly, bitterly,

I drink your blood for Christ the hard,

I eat your bone for Christ the soft,

because I love you, two to two, Alfonso,

and almost could say it, eternally.

****

What's got into  me, that I whip myself with the line

and believe I'm followed, at a trot, by the period?

What's got into me, that I've placed

an egg on my shoulders instead of a cloak?

What's gotten into me, that I live?

What's gotten into me, that I die?

What's got into me, that I have eyes?

What's got into me, that I have a soul?

What's got into me, that ends in my neighbor

and begins the role of wind in my cheek?

What's gotten into me, that I count my two tears,

sob earth, and hang the horizon?

What's gotten into me, that I cry from being unable to cry

and I laugh at the little I've laughed?