Francisco Mallman
Two Poems Translated from the Brazilian Portuguese by Robert Smith
[Untitled]
almost wintry blue i taught you the difference
between invernal and infernal is just one letter—the part
of the world you call yours isn’t about
feeling at home it’s more about the quality
of photo paper—small things escape
your eyes and all the same you go on about
unimportant monuments—the deal was one thousand
days without complaining the plan was to write down
synonyms for love—everything went wrong everything
started turning into something else—there’s nothing wrong
with not liking odd numbers—your birthday is
fifteen plus fifteen mine is fourteen plus fourteen
but some people celebrate without being able to divide evenly—
two holes so enormous they don’t remind you of anything at all
except two holes that don’t remind you of anything—there’s no
saudade where you’re from but there are four words that
mean “life”—i’d fit nicely in your language
[Untitled]
now i’d like the terrace i’d like to lie down now
i’d like the machinery for dreaming without sleeping i’d like
to rest now i’d like to forget i’d like to run
without gloves now i’d like to receive you without pain
i’d like to write a new poem i’d like to smile with
more teeth now i’d like something obvious
that would still let fictional mysteries drift
over my head my face i’d like to skip three weeks
i’d like to undo the decision to never again
confuse victim and aggressor now i’d like to say
a brutally simple sentence so that afterwards i’ll
never have to explain myself again