When my dear love died, I could not believe
I walked around the bedroom whispering repeatedly: "I can't believe, I can't believe"
I kissed his still warm lips and touched his curly hair ...
I took his heavy silver ring with my name engraved on it and placed it on my finger ...
Even thought it is too loose, I still wear it.
II
Lots of people came around and left
They looked, they hugged me, they cried ...
Like they all had been left orphans.
III
The person they talk and write about (or slowly forget ) ...
is not as important as the one that lies inside of my heart
my love, my boy ...
IV
God
(or was it the Death?) struck him with a heavy sickle ... my darling's heart
(you can not see the wound, but it hurt me too).
He opened his eyes, dazzled with air,
said my name loud in a hospital room, and left.
When the doctors left (and took with them their useless machines)
we were alone ... the Death ... (or was it God?) my love and I ...
I buried my face on his shoulder as I used to do
Said the loving words we use to say to each other
But his silence was absolute, his muted heart ... and my heart ...
pierced by the golden sickle ....
Whenever I go I leave this trail of blood (dense and sad ... the bleeding will never stop)
V
It does not make sense that I am here alive
His face contemplates mine - creased and sad in the picture I keep on my desk
In the other pictures he smiles at me, he is in love and happy.
It does not make sense this surviving thing ...
But here I am ... for the others to see ... whole ... just in appearance
I look through the window, hoping that I will see him
Hoping that he will be there waving at me, with his wide and generous face
I hope he will be by my side when I wake up ...
I hope I will always hear his voice on the phone ...
I know and I don't know if all these things are possible,
Death is an abyss without bridges
I survive ... just because it does not make sense.
VI
I thought we were just starting ...
our home ... just foundations.
But it was probably completed and I did not know.
We had built few walls ... the roof sloped the right way,
and there was glass in the windows.
(We were happy there even with the storms outside.)
Everything was built in such a short period of time ... the front door ... he left like he would buy newspaper and come back ...
This same door seems high, hard, impenetrable
but on the other side, my love could see wonders that intrigued both of us ...
VII
I have written about death all these years in books and poems ...
Always thought I understood it, at least a little bit ...
But now that it has destroyed my life
Ripped my heart apart
Took my love away
I feel like I am just starting to comprehend its message
By taking him from me, it is giving him back to me to be even more "mine"
Inside of me there is a puzzle ... and inside of this puzzle is my love
Not even God will take him from here.
VIII
My dear love died
Living without him hurts.
We had no children together
our past was so brief that it was always present.
One day he bought a pair of wedding rings
made from heavy silver, antique style;
only our names engraved, with no date, and said:
"We are one forever."
I still cannot believe he is dead and this might save me for now.
To get out of bed each day is a heroic act,
light a cigarette, answer the phone, drinking coffee.
But I do it all:
talk, walk, get visits.
Buy furniture for the house where I live without him, wondering: would he like it?
In some secret place inside of me ... I find strength ... to lift the cup, light a cigarette,
to smile when someone tells me: "You look great today "
Then I think if it would not hurt less if I jumped from the eleventh floor.
IX
My dear love, is now dead,
on the other side of the border that seduced both of us,
mute and motionless as if he did not exist:
I know you exist ... intensely, ardently you exist,
done and undone in the fire of a love greater than ours ...
My beloved boy, now dead, lives forever,
you shall keep the intense look that always understood me,
shall keep the beautiful mouth that called my name,
the beautiful, restless hands, which burned when touching mine.
Help me now ... you are silent ... to bear this other life
and decipher this high, impenetrable wall that surrounds me ...
X
We never had children together, and he complained:
"Our love deserves at least one child."
Our child is my pain today,
brightness that made us dizzy,
the memory that I keep in my insomnia.
Our child is the time ...
time to speak of my dear love:
his strength and weaknesses,
of his anger and tears,
of his need to be loved and accepted as he is now ...
XI
My love has embarked on his death
as if he was going to a romantic date, impatient.
He left me this beaten love, this defeat.
But he also left the light of all these years,
and the feeling that he finally found love
the love that even with all my devotion, I would not be able to offer him.
(One day, we will celebrate together.)
XII
If I had lost my arms and legs
and had my heart pierced with a cold knife
my eyes blinded with hooks
had my skin removed like a rotten animal
- nothing would hurt more than knowing my love is dead,
deposited on this hopeless well of silence
where he cannot answer me ...
(Except in my dreams, when you look at me
and your hands touch my flattened open wounds, empty.)
XIII
My love died
I need to live his death until the end
Died before banality and exhaustion were part of our relationship
Maybe he died at the right time, so our love could be beautiful forever
From him, comes the pain, but also tenderness,
the light that allows me to see his face on other people's faces
to see his figure on the other people's figures
to hear in the silence his unexpected childish laughter
XIV
Life is strange:
I'm mustering my days
like a flock of disordered sheep ...
this sad and cold city of Porto Alegre ...
where he liked to be watching the sunset, meeting his friends.
"Dying is the reverse of desire"
said by him, who wanted life, longed for death, wanted justice,
wanted peace and eternity.
Life is strange:
when I reread his own saying,
"To live is to modulate the death, in blood and pain I prepare my trip. "
Love is also strange:
it has an appointment with death's mutilation, agreed minutes, checking the watch to strike us.
It is strange this love that I feel now ...
my beloved boy is behind the foggy mirror
where I sometimes make out his figure
like an aquarium ... wrapped in silence.
More than never ... love commands my life
XV
Do not talk loud around me
always walk on tiptoes.
Especially, do not touch me.
Pretend you do not see that I look lost,
and that don't understand the questions as fast as before,
that I look tired and dull like I never did before.
Please be silent around me.
I do not care about daily things or anything mystical.
Do not want to discuss the market prices
or the great mysteries of eternity.
XVI
I take my love inside of my heart
Like those who carry the body of a dead child in their arms
XVII
My love ... you taught me so many things
about myself and the world ... I knew so little about them
When the dark night of this loss is gone
I want to see by your eyes
and love by your love the things that I still have left
My love, you are alive inside of me forever
Despite the wrinkles and the sad look
I owe you this:
Love life again, the same way you now love your death.
No comments:
Post a Comment