It was passed from one bird to another,
the whole gift of the day.
The day went from flute to flute,
went dressed in vegetation,
...
I can write the saddest lines tonight.
Write for example: ‘The night is fractured
and they shiver, blue, those stars, in the distance’
...
And because love battles
not only in its burning agricultures
but also in the mouth of men and women,
...
I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.
...
When I cannot look at your face
I look at your feet.
Your feet of arched bone,
your hard little feet.
...
And it was at that age ... Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
...
Out of lemon flowers
loosed
on the moonlight, love's
lashed and insatiable
...
You've asked me what the lobster is weaving there with
his golden feet?
I reply, the ocean knows this.
You say, what is the ascidia waiting for in its transparent
...
Translated from the Spanish by Christopher Logue
Drunk as drunk on turpentine
From your open kisses,
...
How neatly a cat sleeps,
sleeps with its paws and its posture,
sleeps with its wicked claws,
and with its unfeeling blood,
...