The Desert (2) [There's a ship in the middle of the desert.] Poem by Raúl Zurita

There's a ship in the middle of the desert. A
ship lying on the stones of the desert and
above, the sinking tombstone of the sky. The
inverted ocean of the sky falls on the stones and
they cry out. No-one except stones can cry out
like that. Mireya covers her ears so as not to
hear the screeching of the desert. Chile cries
out, the Chilean desert cries out. Mireya gathers
small plastic flowers in front of a ship that's
beached on the mounds of stones.

Here are the coasts, the stubborn sealess coasts
climbing backwards up the dead waves of the
mountains.

Mireya says she is the mother of Chile. That she
is the mother of a ship lying in the middle of
the desert.

Translated by William Rowe