Enrico Palandri
A Dog Just Barked
A dog just barked.
Distracted by the world
I return to our silence.
I repeat your name
I stencil inside my eyes
The way you hold your cigarette
And look at me bemused.
I’d like to wait
But can’t because each
Instant feeds this longing
And when you ask me again
“What’s up? Why do you
Look at me like that?” how can I say
“Nothing. There are no sounds
In this pub, and no chairs.
And a howling dog in my heart
Echoes the world
That I lost.”
You would laugh and mock
My words, and with some off-hand
Smirk, shrugging off my angst you’d add
“You’re going too fast”.
I should like to be more precise: “Yes, and
I’ve just been undone, like a meteorite
That falls from the skies and the air’s friction
Has destroyed it even before it lands.”
You would laugh again, and my soul
Would rise and disperse among
Those little clouds of smoke
That so enviably now are
Caressing your nose.
Hence I just look somewhere else
And say “Nothing. Nothing’s up.”
Hoping that perhaps when you reach for your coat,
And look at your watch and announce
To your little audience
“It’s late, I must go!”
That just perhaps
You will touch my hand
Without saying “I’m sorry”.
Translated by Enrico Palandri
Page(s) 228-229
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