Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Marco Antonio Flores, "Requiem Por Luis Augusto," trans. Edward Dorn and Gordon Brotherston

         1

They had the effect
of ash
and they contaminated the humus
Despite everything that had been done
men
made furrows
thrust their hands into the embers
But the wrong
was deeper, much deeper
Despite it
“mankind has said
Enough!
and has begun to move”
In the meantime
we go on snagging ourselves
on fear, on justifications
Oyster shells
go on
swelling their form
around the hunger
of others
still we are incapable
of shouting or letting our chests out
Ours is the time of the few who prey
“I may die tomorrow
but others will take my place”
The idols saw him leave
and wept

         2

A child not yet 5 years old
dies of hunger:
violence to the people
Equitable and sacred
supply and demand
A fat man bursts
engorged inside his cheque book
The plateau secretes its coyotes
its elevated buildings
its mink coats
its cadillacs
The old ladies drip
their pity tottering
at their charity balls:
The pain is of great antiquity
                                                      but not eternal
Ours is the time
of plunder
Yes “mankind has said
Enough!
and has begun to move”

         3

We are usurpers of the easiness
of buying food
Across from us is another face
full of hunger’s disease
I am afraid but not terrified
Terror conquers man
Man subjugates fear
I am going to stand
in the eye of the wind
to kill my flesh
Then I intend
over the ground
to drag myself
To place my name in the roots
to bury those roots very deep
                                                     in the watertable
From the highest peak
the net will stretch there
that holds our dreams

         4

“I may die tomorrow
but others will take my place”
A girl weeps
in her bereavement, abandoned
His eyes were eyes
as an executed man has eyes
Again the sun is out
It is not a tree
which casts the shade
It is the wood
You must not be confused or cry
The rose germinates
and climbs
protected in the underbush
Young men take themselves off
by the uplands
                             or by the lowlands
And down from the hills
come torrents
of geraniums
which salute you
clenching their right hands
People go on being automatons
even when their knife
of death
rips
more audible
in the mid night
The street’s corners hide
in the house of the sun
The multitude howls in terror
Friends give
their arteries
to the wolf for nothing
and appear then
on pedestrian pages
busted by bullets
There is one response only:
Violence

         5

“I may die tomorrow
but others will take my place”
His eyes were the eyes
of an executed man
The asphalt wept fire
in his side
In the meantime
                                all of us
say we enjoy
our crust-of-bread paycheck
We are contented and lower
our heads
to his death
content to sob hypocritically
It is not ours, this waiting time
His burnt throat
propagated the morning which half unbends our fingers
Silence slaughters dreams
All is absence

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