THE POEM BODIES MAKE

 

By Luis Alberto Ambroggio

Translated by Naomi Ayala

 

 

Behold the poem the bodies

of gods who love one another make;

how they fit into each other and become whole

in their secret recesses,

the sensual possession

of a divine garden.

 

Behold it in its clear and firm curves,

soft masterpieces inhabited by fire.

See the lovers’ intertwined legs,

their arms closing around the loving sphere.

Listen to how they knock against each other with the breath

            of waves;

heart open, light infusing them;

a giddiness of being singing in heartbeats,

the sky brushing, volcanoes of sweet sweat,

above and below mountains.

 

Behold the sketch of its endless lines,

the blood-stone, black sun,

the silken passages, unisonous skin.

Come through this poem with its language of touch,

in the bare light of night

stroke the soul behind the eyes,

delight in the ultimate flavor of ripe fruit

and return over again, engrossed,

with love’s force, with thirst and hunger,

with rain, flowers of sunlight, and wind,

with the scent of syllables, to its beauty…

the very poem bodies make.

 

 

I AM A VICTIM OF HAPPINESS

 

By Luis Alberto Ambroggio

Translated by Yvette Neisser

 

Dawn, we will disobey the sadness over our names,

and the river will be blood.

I will always bless the daybreaks with fire.

You are water and I am air in blue space.

There is no solitude or cold in our moons,

and their nights entwine us together.

I will gather you in dew, rays of light, trills of hope

and I will convince myself once more

that everything is well made.

 

 

 

INFINITE DOOR

By Luis Alberto Ambroggio

Translated by Yvette Neisser

 

 

Dawn is night’s door

and when it begins to fall, it soars with white linens,

a full-moon celebration in the waters,

in the jungle of our dream.

It gives wings to our days.

I open it to enter the mansion of your light.

You close it to protect the sacred geographies.

 

 

 

Touches

 

By Luis Alberto Ambroggio

Translated by Yvette Neisser

 

Dawn, my woman,

the white of your heartbeats

invades the secret of my rock.

It’s an ardor that cleaves to my dryness

and awakens a sea of harsh winds

between gently caressing hands.

 

Inside we conjugate flowers

and as a nameless sun rises

we raise our cold legs

to placate the night,

that long death that hovers over foaming waves.

Today is the day, the hot month,

the  February we dreamed of after the unhappy birds fled

through blind air.

Today is the day to kiss each other with lips become wings

in the promise to relish each other to the utmost limit,

to free our arms, flesh, the clouds of dreams

until, for the first time, our bodies

sing together,

in the pure dawn,

the sky’s shore.