According to a Cloud Whispering to her Sister

 

 

According to my father

According to his neighbour

According to a scarecrow in the field

That accuses the lazy birds

Of not waking the timid morning

 

Of shaking the roses' shirt

And confusing the dew -

 

According to a cloud sitting on a shoulder of words

That returns wet with a kind child

Whose neighbours pretend not to notice him

So he can choose the apples from their dresses

And fiddle with the cherries -

 

According to a child pulling a big bag of books

Ascending the rhythm victoriously on music's scale –

 

According to my father

According to a seagull under his shirt

That was trained by the sea's rituals

And chose a moon, pasting it on the ceiling of his words –

 

According to a cloud which, prior to the train, left him a card

Bearing the words, 'The horse keeps the home company' –

 

And according to my father...and me, I say (to a cloud sitting whispering to her sister)

That the youth planted the poem in a vessel of water

But the girl's hand took root on a stone

And on a precious stone, another stone sat me

 

'So, my son, watch out

The poem does not sleep on a bed for passers-by 

So don’t trust the water

You will not drag the wise sea by your hand

After this.

O son...'

But he goes back to his silence

In his eyes a sky extinguished again

 

But I found the sea lying on her dress

The sea emerges from its solemnity

Crosses the street of survivors

Towards the café

It rises out of its clothes

And descends into a poem

Like an absent-minded tourist

Spilling the coffee of meaning over his delirium

 

And the sea walks out of the port

Smiling

Elegant in its simplicity

Dragging Saturday by the ears

Confiscating its cigarette ends

And pushing it to the calendar

 

And the sea…

‘Don’t you have a sail?’

I said, Father, the youth’s cloud followed him to the café 

His heart's needle suspended on a star

Father,

This is the story of a cloud which descended to the water of words

 

‘And you – do you believe that?’

Father,

The youth planted the poem in a vessel of water

But the girl

Sat sewing the ceiling of her sky

The girl, just like us

Was distracted in her shyness

Then her Lord dropped into her palm

She covered him with the other, and he slept.

 

This is the story of a cloud which descended to the water of words.