MAYDAY I break out: the hard war endures;
empty is the vessel from which I part –
it slacks in the deep, bored by the sway,
a leaking slit, a lack – not in the least
a cork pail with pores made to drift.
I specify: it’s terracotta, it cracks
and I am sparse in dense fluidity.
Too late, I know, help will come, if ever
so feebly I flash in obscurity
and the writing does not stay on water;
here I lie: hardly an erasure, less
than a seam the wave will slowly stitch
a slumbering quilt over where I sink.
Where it says God, it should say death.
Where it says poetry, it should say nothing.
Where it says literature, it should say what?
Where it says I , it should say death.
Where it says love, it should say Inês .
Where it says cat, it should say Barnabé.
Where it says friendship, it should say friendship.
Where it says pub, it should say salvation.
Where it says pub, it should say perdition.
Where it says world , it should say get me out of here.
Where it says Manuel de Freitas, it must
surely be a very sad place.
In a distant memory, narrow Adamczewski Street
goes round our eyes until it opens into
the graveyard on top of the hill, where children play
king of the castle in a birdless tree.
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