Luis Amorim de Sousa
Private Scene
obsessed with books
I´ll undoubtedly never read
I perceived that you’ve undressed
near the radiator
the line which the eye pursues
if not with care then with metrical rigour
finds another cadence in your flesh
already flushed by the warmth
another thought presents itself
explicit innuendo seized upon
contrary to my body’s gravity
the book stays open on the carpet
[MW and AdL in Modern Portuguese Poetry, Selection and Introduction by Alberto de Lacerda, The Journal of the American Portuguese Society, New York, 1978]
Luís Amorim de Sousa was born in Angola in 1937. He grew up in Lisbon and Lourenço Marques, now Maputo, the capital of Mozambique, and left for London in 1959. He has lived his entire adult life abroad, mainly in London and Washington DC. Luís Amorim de Sousa has published four collections of verse and two autobiographical narratives. Another book of verse is due out this year. He is married and lives in Hampstead.
Except for ‘Private Scene’, the poems here are unpublished.
Except for ‘Private Scene’, the poems here are unpublished.
Translated by Marc WidershienLuis Amorim de Sousa, Alberto de Lacerda
Page(s) 165
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The