J o s é A l f r e d o H e r n á n d e z —

translated by C a r l o s L a r a

from Tren / Train

6

I am atmosphere.

I will journey to your quadruple star where the nacreous entanglement is found.

I will chew the syrup of noctambulant roses, sinking quickly into the truth of a few certain things.

Look well, look how much has grown from yesterday to today that my eye has cast to the blue of the sky, and he says that he has been as far as the little house of concave mirrors.

If that were true! If that were true!

The only thing I believe in is this day of yours, of mine, this day that smells the seaweed, smells the fog and the phosphorescence of the sea.

All of which is the same as my very prudent chastity.

Ringlet of air. Pain of the pencil. Paper teardrop.

I did not draw my name in the arena of the sun, more like in the mouth of a sad river, a mouth full of snow.

These windows with frames of clarity are my three sisters with silhouettes of pain, pain of new wood.

Fiancées of the sea’s banisters, joyous in pure virtue because they are space and the illumination of opposing lines.

Trouvére of the map of my comings and goings, I did not want to cry on the journey.

I did not want to cry.

7

There is no one, no one, because we are all that is and is not, we are indecipherable, and we are empty.

You and I. The cardboard moon –oh shard of broken glass!

We’ll break the strings of the harp of air, and your hands will thrash the vagabond stars.

We’ll travel in a snail coach under the sea, until we meet the light of your gaze.

8

I have returned from a distant voyage with my sled dog. I have returned, and I am there, much closer than ever and more distant than the Orient.

Playing with my fleeced hands, playing, with cards of air.

I have existed in time. Now I am nonexistent. And if I awoke I would be the legend of mud.

And despite everything I have danced a thousand times in the biconcave night with the sprouts and frogs.

12

A gentle crow rests on the sea wall. When I walked the streets of the sky, I always discovered the same hankering for death.

Which is why I’d sign my protest of pure aroma in the air.

The crazy train took me to the steps of my brother, left me to polish my crystal teeth.

And now that I am sound, I will go to the moon and make myself a little house of snow.

13

In the white lily of morning, they have beaten the vowels, all without a warble, all nameless, and the little sparrows in the air and clouds have declared themselves strikers for peace.

So we’ve clipped time with silk scissors.

20

I still believe in cinema.

I can feel the scrawl of my soul’s abrasive voice; but only there in the distance of the coldness that enters the panorama of my mouth.

So many times have I cried alabaster while you drew shapes in the night wind!

22

My name is the gardener of the garden of my father. The idea: to have been transformed in God. And the letters of my name have gambled with Mother’s rosary.

Profound sacrilege, this drinking of stars in the darkness of the room.