My sister swallowed an elephant.
You may ask, ‘How could she have done that?’
For your information, this is a surrealistic poem.
I don’t have to explain anything. I just write
down my dreams. You might be prone to ask,
‘What do you do if you can’t remember your dreams?’
You just make them up. A surrealistic poem
depends upon imagination. A realist
might say, ‘Then it’s not really a dream
if it’s made up?’ But dream experts, like
Carl Jung, called dreaming while awake,
‘Active imagination.’ The surrealist argues
that most of life is made up. The only
two realities are death and taxes.
My sister spit out the elephant.
I’m not forgetting this is a surrealistic poem.
I’m not responsible for the images.
They come from the part of the brain
that is seldom used – the imaginative area.
My sister spit out the tail. Now I’m
becoming logical again. I’m finished with
the tail. I did this part to show that
a surrealistic poem can be totally
logical once you accept the premise.
And you might ponder, ‘What
in God’s name is this guy doing?
Why doesn’t he just write
his surrealistic poem and be
done with it?’ Because a good
surrealistic poem never goes away.
The images stay with you for a long time,
longer than it takes to swallow an elephant
and spit it out, minus the tail.

CORPO ESTROPIADO

Não nades no mar quando estiver a chover,
disse a mãe. Um relâmpago pode cair na água,
& tu ficarás paralisado. Tu não gostas
de comer vegetais. Imagina teres de
passar o resto da vida a ser um deles.
Alguém irá ter de dar-te banho, levar-te
à casa-de-banho, & alimentar-te.
As crianças vão meter-se contigo. Mas
podes ter sorte, & ser atingido apenas
por uma baixa voltagem. Então serás
um vegetal esperto, como um espargo.
Conseguirás fazer a cama sozinho -
o que não fazes agora - mas as pessoas
vão sentir pena de ti e conversarão contigo.
Podes pensar que é divertido ficar
todo o dia a vegetar em casa. Mas,
de cada vez que pensares em ti próprio,
como a vontade de comer um gelado de chocolate,
o pensamento tornar-se-à vago, & desaparecerá.

A SEPARAÇÃO É DIFÍCIL

"Não temos nada em comum",
disse eu. "Somos duas pessoas completamente diferentes.
Não faz sentido nenhum que fiquemos juntos."
Mas ela começou a esfregar-me o pénis
através das calças, & lembrei-me de repente
que ambos gostamos de comida indiana.

TIMING

Depois de fazermos amor, saímos
para jantar. Tentei não comer
o meu linguado mais depressa do que ela.
Uma vez que não conseguimos ter
um orgasmo simultâneo, poderíamos
pelo menos acabar de comer ao mesmo tempo.

PERDA DE TEMPO

Se eu soubesse que não estavas interessada em mim,
não teria desperdiçado todas aquelas noites a
masturbar-me sobre ti. Teria fantasiado
sobre alguém muito menos acessível,
como a Madonna. Uma semana depois, ao ver-me ainda sozinho
na cama, não teria ficado tão decepcionado.

ESTA NOITE NÃO

Ela disse que eu não podia ir com ela
para o seu apartamento, porque
tinha de estudar para um teste. E
que eu não conseguia ajudá-la,
porque eu não era bom a matemática.
A única coisa que eu era bom era
a tirar-lhe as roupas, mas
isso ela já sabia fazer.

poemas lidos aqui

New Sheets

I won't be around forever, Mother said.
One day I'm going to die, so I might
as well nag you a little bit more,
while I have the chance. And when
I'm dead you'll have to rely on someone else
to tell you that it's time to change the sheets,
& I hope for your sake, that it won't
be your wife, because she's going to get
tired of doing it, & she'll start to demand that you
& her sleep on separate beds, which will mean
that pretty soon you'll have to be using separate silverware,
so she won't always have to be the one to wash them.
And before you know it, she'll want you
to live in your own house so you
won't be able to mess up hers, & divorce is more likely
to happen when you aren't living together.

The Bald Headed Doll

When I was five years old, Father said,
I ripped the hair out of my sister's doll,
& used it as a wig. I took my violin
& a cup, & played waltzes up & down
the street. I thought people would throw me
pennies, but they threw garbage at me
from their windows, & one woman threw her old shoes.
My mother screamed at me when she got
home. And my sister tried to put the hair
back into the doll, one strand at a time,
& when she couldn't, she also threw it at me.

Pretending

We went to Dan Lynch's, & listened
to White musicians pretending that they
were Black. And the people next to us jumped
up & down, pretending that they were rock stars.
And I put my hand on your knee, pretending
that I was your lover. You remained aloof. Why
did you have to be the only one who insisted on being yourself?

poemas lidos aqui

Don't stick your finger in the ketchup bottle,
Mother said. It might get stuck, and
then you'll have to wait for your father
to get home and pull it out. He
won't be happy to find a dirty fingernail
squirming in the ketchup that he's going to use
on his hamburger. He'll yank it out so hard
that for the rest of your life you won't
be able to wear a ring on that finger.
And if you ever get a girlfriend, and
you hold hands, she's bound to ask you
why one of your fingers is deformed
and you'll be obligated to tell her how
you didn't listen to your mother, and
insisted on playing with a ketchup bottle,
and she'll get to thinking, He probably won't
listen to me either, and she'll push your hand away.

lido aqui

Choice of Diseases

Now that I'm sick & have
all this time to contemplate
the meaning of the universe,
Father said, I understand why
I never did it before. Nothing
looks good from a prone position.
You have to walk around to appreciate
things. Once I get better I don't
intend to get sick for a while. But
if I do I hope I get one of those diseases
you can walk around with.

Correcting an Unbalance

I never listen to commercials, Father said.
They're aimed at trying to sell me something
I don't need. If I do need it I want to know
that the need originated from me & not
from others. I don't want to end up with lots
of junk I'm only going to throw out. Half
the things in this house aren't used. We
only really need food, clothing, shelter,
& of course, each other. You do need me.
Don't you? Your mother never gives me
much opportunity to talk. I'm supposed to listen.
I'm able to talk to you, but it'd please me
if you said something once in a while.

Trocando dólares por cêntimos

Levei a minha navalha para a escola, disse o Pai,
e tracei um boneco na minha carteira. O reitor
disse-me que eu não concluiria o curso a não ser
que lhe desse cinco dólares para emendar o erro.
Os meus pais deram-me o dinheiro, uma soma
considerável naquele tempo. Eu fui ao banco
e troquei-o por 500 cêntimos. Coloquei-os
dentro de um saco de papel e bati à porta do reitor.
Despejei os cêntimos sobre a sua secretária
& disse-lhe que violara o meu porquinho-mealheiro.
Pensei que ele teria pena de mim & me diria
que eu guardasse o dinheiro. Mas ele disse-me que não
podia aceitar os cêntimos, que eu tinha de ir a um banco
e trazer-lhe cinco dólares. Era um tipo duro.

O meu peixinho dourado morto

Eu queria ter um jacaré como animal de estimação,
mas os meus pais arranjaram-me um peixinho dourado.
Quando ele morreu a minha mãe atirou-o pela sanita abaixo.
Disse-me que se o enterrássemos no jardim
um gato poderia desenterrá-lo & comê-lo.
Fiquei danado foi com o meu pai por usar a casa-de-banho
dez minutos depois do funeral.
Ela não tinha respeito nenhum pelos mortos.

Braço cortado

Não ponhas o teu braço fora da janela,
disse a Mãe. Um carro pode aparecer de repente
por trás de nós, e cortá-lo. Então o teu pai
terá que parar, colocar a parte separada
na bagageira, e levar-te ao hospital.
E isto não é como as peças do teu telescópio,
que se voltam a encaixar. Um médico terá que te coser.
Deixarás de poder usar camisolas de manga curta.
Não vais querer que se vejam os pontos.

tradução: José Luis Peixoto

lidos aqui

I'd like to take my family to the lake,
Father said, so they could see how well
the animal & fish kingdoms get along.
You hardly ever see ducks fighting.
If they do, it's done in private.
We should follow their example,
& not air our dirty laundry in public.
That was what I told your mother
at the restaurant, that she should
save her complaints for when we
get home. She said she had already
complained there. She was hoping
she'd get better results if she changed locations.

lido aqui

"When you have blown your nose,
you should not open your handkerchief
and inspect it, as though pearls or rubies
had dropped out of your skull."
The Book of Manners (1958)

After you have blown your nose,
Father said, it's not polite to look inside
your handkerchief to see what it looks like.
You're not a doctor. What's more important
is getting the handkerchief back into your pocket
without staining your pants. There are some things
it's better not to look at. It should be left
to your imagination, but if you have
a strong desire to look you can always
find pictures of it in a medical book.