Tuesday, December 12, 2023

HOMERO ARIDJIS ~

 



The Dreaming Body



The day will come

when an unfamiliar voice

will call you by your name,

and your eyes will comb the street

searching for nobody.


The day will come

in which your hands want

to trap your ghost

only to catch

the heartbeat of a stranger.


The day will come,

on the street, when your

double appears in person

and on its becoming one with you,

you disappear.





The First Dream



Against political harassment,

against criminal violence,

against fear

I built a wall of poetry.





Not All

                  For Norman Manea


Not all the stars are angels in flames

not all the rivers reach the sea

not all rains are crystal clear

not all hunger is the best sauce in the world

not all things that have teeth hunt down someone to eat

not all wombs are the door to paradise

not all dreams have an awakening

not all that I say is for sure




The Tree

                  For Chloe and Eva Sophia


Then the tree had a dream

it dreamed it was in a wood

and its branches that leaned out

onto my window were full of birds


it dreamed its seeds fell to the ground

and turned into other trees

into other dreams that grew

inside and outside us


it dreamed there were two roads

one which went down to the underworld

and the other which rose up to the Horizon

where evening never fell


it had to stay in the same place

staring through a thousand green eyes at man

who came in trucks with chainsaws

to cut it in two


at that moment the tree awoke

saw itself with shoes on its roots

and like an uprooted angel

took to the road



____________________________

Homero Aridjis

Self-portrait in the zone of silence

New Directions, 2023

translated from the Spanish by George McWhirter