from Whores
With me is a railroad man
in a railroad uniform,
with a railroad whistle and pocket watch,
and a railroad cap.
He talks about trains,
the express, the cannonball.
He remembers a girl
he left behind on the train.
Before he lies down
he turns off the lamp.
Outside, falling snowflakes
mingle with electric sparks.
Asleep he holds me
by my breasts,
still wearing his wool socks
with a toe sticking out of each one.
In the morning he runs
across the tracks.
He loses his cap.
He finds his cap.
~
With me is a man
who talks too much,
talks about everything,
so he sees nothing.
The washpan with red
and blue roses,
or the frog in the pan
with twelve baby frogs.
Sees neither my left
nor my right shoulder,
nor my cheeks caked
with thick powder.
Sees neither my thing,
nor his thing,
babbling so much he forgets
why he came.
I stuck a finger
under his tongue
and my finger stayed
in his mouth.
~
With me is a young woman
who loves only women.
She smokes unfiltered cigarettes,
sways while she walks,
pays for my services
in foreign currency.
Her breasts are still
just two drops of honey,
she uses a whip,
sips ghastly concoctions.
We dream of each other,
exchange places.
When I wake, I see beside me,
my own funny childlike face
with buck teeth
and high cheek bones.
At night, a beard and a mustache
grow on her. In the morning,
she is again herself,
neither better nor worse than she is.
~
With me is a long-legged,
long-eared stallion.
His other horsy virtues
I won't even mention.
He bolted from under
his master's whip.
He's tired of high-class mares,
he wants only me.
He strokes me with his head
and his tufted mane.
He's happy when I ride him
naked, wearing only boots.
His eye is human
and so is his impatience
and his well-developed
sense of humor.
He eats blue-tinted sugar cubes
out of my hand.
In some respect, he's a man.
In others, just a horse.
~
With me is a grinning
skeleton,
when he walks, the bones
make a racket.
At times he loses
some small bone,
so we look for it
among the bedding.
Expertly, I fit
the missing bone between two others
It's tiring work,
but it gives me pleasure.
At times, he tries to drink
from my glass.
The way the wine puddles on the floor
makes him truly miserable.
If he had any nerves,
he'd lose them in bed
having to listen
to the rattle of his bones.
~
With me is the God
of all gods.
I have no other god
but him.
Without fuss
he kisses me everywhere;
on my head, on my forehead,
on my undone hair,
on my mouth while I speak,
in my armpits,
on my wet tits,
on my left and on my right knee,
inside my lungs, in my heart,
in my bowels,
in both kidneys,
and in my full and in my empty gut.
With great art he handles
the venerable tool.
God is truly within me,
or any other girl like me.
____________________
Devil's Lunch
Aleksandar Ristovic
selected poems
translated by Charles Simic
I'm always returning to Ristovic.
There is a accent mark over the "c"
I can't do it, but I do it with a pen in hand.
And again Charles Simic at the helm.
They should give him a prize for his
decades of work as translator, always
sizzling, and maybe they have.
The only prizes I pay attention to now
are the birthdays of our two
granddaughters, the rest
is filigree.
I also adore this edition
and design from Faber & Faber.
Did you know there was only one Faber?
