***
Child, go home.
Your home is nowhere?
Then go back to the womb.
No mother’s womb?
Go to father’s semen.
Your father is nowhere?
Go to mum’s tubes.
Is the egg there barren?
Then, little one, flow away
in her menstrual blood
just as her longing
goes down the drain —
go that way too.
Let the girl be.
Child, go home.
Fish
No water
only sky
fills this fish’s brain.
No water
but a longing to fly
is in this fish’s body.
Into the brimming ocean
she is emptying herself
incessantly, over centuries.
She passes by
small fish, big fish.
Lost in thought, this fish
asks herself oh,
where did your ocean
go?
The swimming fish
repeats this question
as if it were a prayer-mantra.
The fish does not know
that sky has filled her brain
that the skull-smashing ritual
has already begun
inside her.
You Will Say Night
You will say night
and night will be
You will say day
and day will be washed
You will say colour
and all the butterflies
of the earth will come flying
You will think love
and the horizon will open
a hidden rainbow
You will be tormented
and in another city
her skin
will burn
You will say nightand memory will fall awayYou will say dayand the earth will be empty
You will be silent
and rocks will explode
as far away as the moon
You will not look at her
and she will be caught
invisible
in the throat of the wind
You will say night
and a house
will rise
in the sand
You will say day
and this body, gnawed by old age
will be naked
Only for a day
she will not think
about you
and fish will lose
their way in the water
the burning sun will hang
helpless in its orbit
the umbilical cord of time
will wind round its own neck
Only for a day
she, forgetful,
will place her lamp
between the sun and moon
and the seven sages
of the heavens will be anxious
letters will shatter
after breaking away from scripts
souls will forget their faces
and there will be no mirrors
Only for a day
you will vanish
in an ethereal mist,
a moment
and darkness will spread
to the ends of the universe
lava will gather
inside the earth
and cockles burn
in their shells
for miles
Only for a day’s
oblivion
this body will turn blue
with its own bite
When it arrives on your doorstep, the first thing every love
asks is: can you jump from the window for me? Can you stab
your heart for me? Every love asks this: can you fly with me,
with only the stumps of your arms?
When love arrives on your doorstep, it will not leave soon.
It has to go to some mountain or valley. To an ocean or river.
It comes to your house out of the blue, and wants to know if
you will come along to drown with it or not.
Every love gives you enough time to die for it.
The ants had lost their way home.
They walked, making lines between our sleep and our bodies.
Their invisible flour stays scattered in their memory, scattered
by some other place and time. They kept going from one end
of the earth to the other in search of it. They sank their teeth
in every living and dead thing. The sorrows of the earth grew
so light with their journeying that directions began to spin in
confusion. The poles began to change places. But nobody
knew the ants’ sorrow.
Long ago, perhaps they were women.
Eyelashes will shed
in her desire to see you
Fingers will be
ants
climbing
slipping
on your feet
Lips will be
a little fly, a tiny mosquito
placing their first touch
on your ears
Her breath
will stroll
through your sleeping body
carefree
as if in an empty house
You will turn
in your sleep
and you won’t
know a thing
Neither
why some loves
keep wandering
this earth
Nor
why bugs and beetles
keep busy
day and night
In the afternoon
you will sit up
a little drowsy
a little thirsty
a little confused
For a while
you won’t know
Why all creation
stirs
at this moment
Who is sobbing?
Where?
Inside
or outside?
This is no time for desire
Mourning Kanjikaa
The first night:
flour
is spilt
on the floor
Perhaps she’ll come
She will come –
She will come and leave a footprint
Perhaps we’ll sleep
We will sleep –
We will sleep all through our mourning
Perhaps she’ll see
She will see –
She will never see us again
Perhaps we’ll tear
We will tear
We will tear out our hair
Perhaps she’ll stop
She will stop
She will stop halfway
Perhaps we’ll forget
We will forget
We will forget ourselves in grief
Just a little hope is needed
like a ray of sun
shining in the earth
like the taste of wet stone
in the water
like a fish leaping
on wet sand
Just a little hope is needed
like a song remembered
in the throat of a mute
like a sigh
stopped in the chest
like the longing of an insect
clinging to glass
like thirst
drowned in the river-bed
Just a little hope is needed
Translated by Lucy Rosenstein with Jane Duran
