Indian Ocean Ode - Luís Carlos Patraquim

robber of the wind and the fragile

Indian Ocean lines that spurt

in clear partying / with my blood

I scarf what I can / untameable

geometry of caves in this

sea / Khayyam vintage wine / drop

all the way to spasm in the rim where I insert

my cedilla when the beloved moves to and fro /

for the Pleiades come from within her

with the scream of daybreak

and wet birds sarong her

tuft / salty rhythm of the monsoons

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Luís Carlos Patraquim (born 1953) Mozambique

Translated by John Mitras

Source: Luís Carlos Patraquim: Ten Poems, John Mitras, Stained Glass, 2011