I Hardly Remember

    Translated by Sandy McKinney

    I hardly remember your voice， but the pain of you

    floats in some remote current of my blood.

    I carry you in my depths， trapped in the sludge

    like one of those corpses the sea refuses to give up.

    It was a spoiled remnant of the South. A beach

    without fishing boats， where the sun was for sale.

    A stretch of shore， now a jungle of lights and languages

    that grudgingly offered， defeated， its obligation of sand.

    The night of that day punished us at its whim.

    I held you so close I could barely see you.

    Autumn was brandishing guffaws and dancebands

    and the sea tore at the pleasure-boats in a frenzy.

    Your hand balanced， with its steady heat，

    the wavering tepidness of alcohol. The gardens

    came at me from far away through your skirt.

    My high-tide mark rose to the level of your breasts.

    Carpets， like tentacles， wriggling down to the strand，

    attracted passers-by to the mouth of the clamor.

    With lights and curtains， above the tedium

    the bedrooms murmured in the grand hotels.

    There are dark moments when our ballast gives out

    from so much banging around. Moments， or centuries，

    when the flesh revels in its nakedness and reels

    to its own destruction， sucking the life from itself.

    I groped around me， trying on your embrace，

    but love was not where your embrace was.

    I felt your hands stroking that physical ache

    but a great nothing went before your hands.

    I searched， down the length of your soulless surrender，

    for a calm bay where I could cast a net，

    yearning to hear a trace of the vendor's voice

    still wet with the glimmer of the flapping minnows.

    It was a spoiled remnant of the South. The aroma

    of muscatel was tainted with whiskey breath.

    I carry that dead embrace inside me yet

    like a foreign object the flesh tries to reject.