The day a sun
of metallic filaments
No loose thread
(lonely steps)
or sun fray
over the curb
The brittle brilliance
of ochres and siennas
on your face as it turns away (wind
whirling, dry as desert)
without looking back.
*
Matrices, ashes, from black
to gray. Shining in the pitch dark, (Someone far away) your sleepless night. In the trash
a fish loses its scales
— (in the soot) yesterday’s papers.
nightblack and silver, the rotten stains —
seeing the sun over clouds
(seeing the sun over clouds.)
Baptista, Josely Vianna. “Renga Fragments”. Translated by Rebecca Kosick