Landscape

Thou hast put me in the depths of the pit,
in the regions dark and deep.

Psalm 88

The wounded sun on the river's soft waves that repeat my form
breaks and languishes in the estuary. Solitude opens my window:
there's only one true horizon. Behind, in the silence of a distant storm,
the intoxicating companion of my dance. The relentless ideas know

I am a slave to their order of absence and memory. And with no horse or ship
to carry me to your side, I no longer hope for a quicker, smoother way
than that favorable final abyss where all is purified by fire or profaned.
I will move through this place and your changes will take their simplest shape.

All things flee my every step. You left me when silence and shadow came
like someone far from home who sees in everything a reminder of what will die.
Going down the hillside, the wind in the poplars repeats your name
and leaves me voiceless in the river bend where the current crashes. I am a birth cry
with one foot in the grave. I've seen how the light goes out after burning bright,
and I know that all has been left behind and there's no way to avoid becoming night.