Flavia Cosma--The Latin Quarter, MadHat Press 2016 (fragment)

Flavia Cosma--The Latin Quarter, MadHat Press 2016 (fragment)

Impossible Summer

Leavening, the air draws silt;
It smells like the city
Has moved to the shore
Of a lake — magic.

Gulls with ruffed feathers
Fall to sleep on hot asphalt;
A heavy miasma brutally sweeps us
To other continents, other coasts.
In our mind’s eyes we see murky lakes,
Dark epidermis breathing desires,
Soft blue and orange skies,
Heart-breaking sadness, vast plains.

A bridge spanning the world,
This alien love
Consumes me wildly
With its boundless absence.

The Bronze of Statues

Kissed on the lips, statues’ bronze
Transforms to gold;
The inert matter opens wide its eyes,
The soul breathes noisily,
A smoky trap, sweet breeze,
The air lustily seizes us.

Caressed on its bosom, statues’ bronze
Transforms to water,
Green water, blissful,
Covers the beloved’s alabaster hands,
Floods his boundless heart
That beats and beats,
Stirs up oceans,
Runs with clouds,
Draws near.

Southern Continent

You remained the same with the mystery
Of your Southern continent,
Full of countries with sonorous names,
Overlapping on maps of the world.

Each of your words
Echoes strange tales
Of blood and wild dreams,
Each of your glances
Stands heavy with sin—
Alien to both you and me.

You walk, hesitate
On slippery roads,
While the ray of your eyes
—a bashful tentacle—
Withdraws slowly to
The protective-narrowed shell
Of a heavy, ancient,
Golden snail.

You, Keeper of Mysteries…

You, keeper of mysteries,
How do you fill your hours, your thoughts?
Which paths do you wander now, my beloved?

Come on; recount everything to me in a whisper,
Tell me the truth, but only half—
Better not. Reveal
Just a fourth,
Or better still, so not to hurt,
Gently lie to me.

Spin a parable only for my use.
Tell me of a time that will never be
But never was, either,
Spin a deceptive, bed-time fairy tale
Where you picked me from amid the stars
From arms of angels with slithery,
Quicksilver bodies.

Fleshless Words

Wasted, fleshless words
Penetrate now and then
Through the room’s walls;
Phantom-words, empty words
Wander through spaces,
Coming and going
Through famished dreams of the night.

Let’s us say good-bye now, my angel;
The time for leaving has caught us
And now outruns us.
It will hang in our next encounters,
In our first hand-shakes,
In our first exchanges of glances.

In rough, high strung and vacillating sentences
We place the end before the beginning,
While love, foreboding its fate,
Bitterly writhes.

Divine Silence

On the green surface of the deep river,
Leaves float
in ordered rows.
Now and then a cat
Mumbles in sleep;
Unachieved desires are wasted in our thoughts.

Words in packs— round hieroglyphs—
Entirely at ease with their fate,
Slacken their pace solemnly
As they pass beneath bridges.

If it weren’t for the cars’ rumble,
Wounding the peace of twilight,
If it weren’t for the startled bird
Darting full speed over waters,
Or for rain’s tardy drops
Beating drums on the damp planks,
We would think that the Divine Harmony
Descended to earth
With the night.

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