Translated from the Spenish by Jeremy Paden

1

I saw Marilyn Monroe suckling her shadow
her breasts were sad
& her nightgown was a straightjacket
She had tatooed on her back a revelation
God was also my lover

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2

In life’s diary
of death
I scribble my initials
with my veins cut open

I saw the Marquis de Sade
ride a streetcar named Desire

It was foggy that night
& Paris was a party
of wounded bats

Botero’s fat ladies
sold themselves under threat

I will write about you, he told them
The semen I carry in my memory
will be my testament

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3

I saw God’s bodyguard
toast Madame Bovary
in a bar on Rue Morgue

She was barefoot
& she had a dog tied to her heart

At another table
God read his obituary
in the Book of the Dead

His bodyguard at that time
didn’t drink champagne
but he loved barefoot women
just like God

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4

Oh that we had something of Rimbaud
even if just a leg

I saw death enter a mirrorless hotel
saw the concierge close a door to infinity
saw God spring from Rimbaud’s arm
saw death board the trolley
In the lobby I saw: Closed for mourning
I saw the police arrive, saw photographers
saw an old ambulance take away a corpse
In the ambulance I saw the naked concierge
I saw his slashed neck, saw blood
saw his eyes those of an ox off to the slaughterhouse
saw his name written on God’s forehead
His name was Verlaine

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5

I saw God take my son’s
toys

He had no childhood
death told me in a dream

He buries them in a grave
beside his mother’s bones

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6

I saw Little Red Riding Hood lost in the forest
She was thirty years old
& her outfit was too tight
The Wolf & The Grandmother waited for her
in the great beyond
I’m too old for this, she mumbled
nobody even remembers me
The world is wide & strange
like this forest where I’m going to die
All I have left is a threadbare cape
& a basket full of God’s bones

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