She


She took two steps forward
Took two steps back
The first step said good day, Sir
The second said good day, Ma’am
And the others said how is the family
Today is a handsome day like a dove in the sky

She wore a burning blouse
She had eyes of the grinding of seas
She had hidden a dream in an obscure armory
She had encountered a corpse in the middle of her head
When she arrived she left the most beautiful part of her far
     behind
When she went something formed itself at the horizon to
     meet her

Her glances were wounds that bled on the hillside
She had wide breasts and she sang the shimmering of her years
She was beautiful like a sky beneath a dove

She had a mouth of iron
And a mortal flag drawn between her lips
She would laugh like the sea that senses carbon in its gut
Like the sea when the moon sees itself drowning
Like the sea which has tasted all the shores
The sea that spills out and falls in the emptiness
         of abundant times

When the stars wrinkle over our heads
Before the north wind opens its eyes
She was beautiful in her horizons of bone
With her burning blouse and her glances of an exhausted tree
Like the sky horseback among the doves


Vicente Huidobro

translated by Julian Ball