Francesc
Parcerisas
(Begues, 1944)
DOGS
THE
HAND OF VIRGIL
PORTRAIT
OF THE POET
¯
DOGS
Look at them: a pack of
mangy dogs
in the habit of trespassing,
of kneading flowerbeds.
Cold, brazen, nothing ever
keeps them at bay
—not even this group of
poets attempting, in the same vein,
to make sense out of life’s
shame.
Crippled, blind, with welts
from blood ticks,
they still sniff with muffled
fury
at the aged she-dog that
inhabits this yard.
And yet what annoys us
links us to them:
shameless, faithful, degraded,
animals
that, like us, lay frantic
or faltering siege
to love’s madness: a supreme
power
that in undoing them will
bring redemption.
Translated
by D. Sam Abrams
Five Poets,
Institute of North American Studies, Barcelona, 1988
¯
THE HAND OF VIRGIL
The battle is slow and devious,
a temporal fire on the
hilltops.
The spears and darts of
the enemy
have decimated so slowly
the parents who protected
us that,
almost without realizing
it,
we find ourselves, silent,
wide open,
hard by the fires on the
battle front.
Thus far the hand of Virgil.
Hereafter the world will
be different:
we are on our own to quell
the fire.
Without a guide, borne
along
by the secret promptings
of a sense for good,
we will perhaps come to
see that the walls
of the fortress, the enemy,
war itself
are merely the shadows,
grown enormous,
of a blaze that is light
and embers.
Purgatory and paradise
we bear within.
Translated
by D. Sam Abrams
Five Poets,
Institute of North American Studies, Barcelona, 1988
¯
PORTRAIT OF THE POET
The wind howls, the water is
frozen thick
in the pipes, it is snowing.
For hours it has been dark
and icicles taper downwards
from the eaves.
Ah, how good it is to close
your book,
snuff out the candle that
flickers on the table
and, in the light afforded
by the fireplace,
curl up in bed, without
making a sound,
not to awaken this youthful
body
that lies, in all its purity,
fast asleep.
Now, buried under the blankets,
close
your eyes and in your mind
re-enact this day
not so different from all
others.
Savor this tiny moment
of enjoyment
that makes everything worthwhile,
as you lay your hand
upon this sighing breast,
deep in sleep,
its face lost among the
soft flowing strands of hair.
Will it be this way, death?
Welcome like this drowsiness
that overtakes you,
this sensation of utter
mildness, devoid of reproach and grievance,
grateful alone for the
incommensurable gifts of life?
Will it be like this that
on our way to darkness
we will meet with light?
Translated
by D. Sam Abrams
Five Poets,
Institute of North American Studies, Barcelona, 1988
¯
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