Paulo Leminski's grave lies in my womb

INVERNACULAR

by Paulo Leminski

This language isn't mine.
It's plain as day.
When meaning goes away,
the word stays behind.
Maybe I'm just lying.
Or am I lying truth?
So I say myself - just,
Maybe - I can barely say.
This isn't my tongue.
The language I speak mutes
a distant song,
the voice, beyond, not a word.
The dialect you utilize
on the left bank of the phrase,
that's what does it, lusifies
me, half, maybe, inside.

°°°

Came the hard way down
the neverending line,
line striking stone,
word kickin round the corner,
tiny empty line,
a line a life, entire,
word, word of mine.

°°°

nothing the sun
can’t speak
all the moon
more chic
no rain fades
this flower

°°°

one of these days i wanna be
a great english poet
of the last century
saying
o sky o sea o folk o destiny
fight in india, 1866,
disappear in a clandestine shipwreck

°°°

put me out
thin me down
chop me up
until
after me
after us
after everything
nothing’s left
but the charm

°°°

between external duty
and eternal doubt
my commercial
heart goes
roundabout

°°°

pauloleminski’s
a crazy mutt
we really should kill him
with sticks and rocks
at the stake with one shot
or else he’s likely
the little prick
to piss all over
our picnic

°°°

a poem
not gotten
is worthy of note
supreme
dignity
of a drifting boat

°°°

back then
we were gonna be homer
the work an iliad no less
but then
it got a little harder
we’d settle for a Rimbaud
an Ungaretti a Fernando any old Pessoa
a Lorca an Eluard a Ginsberg
and then
the provincial poeticule
we always were
behind so many masks
time treated as flowers

°°°

as if i were julio plaza
pleasure
of pure perception
senses
be critique
of reason

°°°

two village idiots
one spends his days
kicking lampposts to see if they’ll turn on
the other his nights
rubbing words
off white paper
every village has an idiot
it treats with sympathy
in a little while i know
they’ll be treating me

°°°

i never wanted to be
a good customer
asking for this or that
red wine
thanks
hasta la vista
i wanted to go in
both feet planted
on the doorman’s chest
telling the mirror
- shut up
and the clock
- hands down

°°°

a good poem
takes years:
five playing soccer,
five more studying sanskrit,
six carrying stones,
nine falling for your neighbor,
seven taking a beating,
four going it alone,
three changing cities,
ten changing the subject,
an eternity, me and you
along together

°°°