Long-listed for the 2023 Griffin Poetry Awards
…A bunch of strange people come every night to find
some warmth and consolation in her songs, those people
who talk of their old, dead friends, as they are still
there accompanying them and every so often they spill
some wine on the floor, a libation to the irreversible
end.
Elias said to him, “will you leave her alone?” “No”,
the other said. Then Elias, being a smart man said
to him: “if you love her get married to her, she’s all
yours”. The other backed down. You see he wanted her
for the bed scene not for his table, that was too much.
Then Elias decided to marry her. God bless his soul.
Elias dead for twenty years now and she relives
each night with the insignificant eternal words.
At that exact moment the man with bouzouki entered:
he swears all day long that he’ll turn his life around
but when night comes and the world becomes deeper
and those distant voices with their deadly attraction
are heard (where do they come from?) as if someone
suddenly pushes him…
Libros Libertad 