i'm going now illmet
the emptiness doesn't fit anywhere an emptiness
like a slung stone you said hang up
and the old women rocking in the Viennese chairs
at four in the afternoon and the scent of limes
as far down as the river mouth
at the end of the street
i'm going now away from these dim suns
where it seems that you are nowhere to be found
and this thick silence
the little fish jump in the lagoon of unare
i'm going now illmet
i didn't know all this would go on so long
i lay down to sleep out of pure fear
like a mirage like a soft bed

today my queen of clubs came to see me
the woman of the bay she of days
stolen from chance
she of fishing at dawn
she carried a basket covered with snaky seaweed
she carried empty skins of sea animals
in her hands little ships
sailed the routes of absence
at the waist of my queen of clubs all the cordage
that held back generations scattered in vain
in her gaze anemones corals and no compass
the eye of god was only a symbol
the phoenician of great forays and finds
of those tough men who sowed themselves as they went
she knew that eyes deceivers sail
adrift
that old seamen never learned the language
of amulets and she smiled
from inside the queen
the careful one she who sows winds and pulls down
great walls fortresses erected in the
estuaries of rivers against throngs
of pirates against anything which could reach
the heart suddenly