BLACK THREAD Poem by Carlos López Degregori

With these white threads that pass through my fingers, I am sewing your wedding dress. Seated in darkness, turned away from the stars whose motions mirror the work of my hands, I sew unseeingly. My tireless feet pump at the pedals of the machine. My heart leaps when I graze the cloth or the vivid cold of the needle. I pierce the night with threads, I knot, I lace small stones, I fix the veil that will forever keep the beauty of your face, the endless train that will set the streets alight. Whistling this painful melody that only I know, I think about how no one can return to me your whiteness that I lost, and make the scissors scream.

Seated in darkness, turned away from the fatal blow of the stars who repeat my stitches, stroking the empty dress, a fine strand of black thread will grow.

Tomorrow, after the elation of the wedding, when all the flowers pinned against the doors and windows wither and the music starts to drown in all the streets and guests go tumbling drunk around the square, you'll flee with your new husband toward the forest clearing.

Listen, Radiance, I will warn you: the sightless moon and greasy stars will spin around the heavens: it will take an eternity to yank the hundred buttons from the dress, to rip the train and tangle it among the trees, to contemplate your white and boiling body underneath the veil. He will extend his trembling hands to lift the tulle, and he will flee when he discovers me in your eyes, hanging there by a long black thread.