versos de inverno / lines of winter

Once again the vulture, the vulture
of sadness falls upon us,
sinks its talons in, slashes
and shreds: -Oh brother
of the desert, brief
oasis of the sun
in this winter: there is no
promised land beyond the body; beyond the word.


Eugénio de Andrade, Close to Speech, trans. Alexis Levitin (Red Floor Press, 2000).