Three Poems by Mariella De Santis
Poems by Mariella De Santis
translated from Italian to English by Anthony Robbins
Awaiting the Barbarians
We shall be no example
for the timorous or faint-hearted
We never mixed our blood
to create a new species
The strong will stay with the strong
the feeble with the feeble
We dreamt we were the first
to be dragged from a keel
We rid our lips of certain
vowels and consonants
with which we burned
to prophesy new words
Killing the dream
won't make us better
Our sacrifice will interest
one person only
But you undressing that night
with such solemnity
As much as me you believed
in honouring our rite
For my Bloom's Day
Laughing we part with death in our hearts.
Nothing is more real than this, you whispered
In the dark of the night, as your white body
More than my own, blended with mine, sank into mine.
Cortązar's poem - the unmade journey to Marrakesh,
Deep sea fishing unenjoyed, technical
Reasons deployed - give us, for five minutes more,
Strength to go on. Two coffees, two biscuits,
A shirt ironed, are the graceful steps to farewell.
Don't forget our future, you enjoin me,
But from my window the past has yet to arrive.
Speaking with Tongues
It's all fallen to bits in my head what little
I knew of your proud tongue
Now everything is getting muddled
I don't any longer know the noun for bread
Or the one for wine if to say right is the same
As indicating left or means go straight ahead.
What little I knew of your proud tongue
Expels from my head my own known tongue.
In the middle I'll stay, as far from the shore
As from the ship, and settle down to wait.
In the meantime let's love each other in silence
Or let's fashion a beautiful child, who
A song will make of Your, Our, My proud tongue.