Chacal et corneille : pas de sang extérieur ni interne
entre eux. Au loin se dessine une dynamite fumante.
Leurs contours, qui ne tiennent qu’à un fil, déjà prêts
à quitter le noyau de noirceur, revêtir un aspect provisoire.

Au-dessus d’eux des bulles de discours qui dérivent, bande dessinée
qu’on feuillète sur la plage piquante et venteuse. Et la grotte moderne est fermée.
Le temps se dégage. On comprend que le photographe enfoui
jusqu’à la ceinture est fait de bronze et ne cadre personne.

Коли я йшов Кам'яним мостом
і грав зіркових воєн маривом,
я несподівано відчув, що простір
став шелестким й багатошарим.

A Jugendstil tower. Myself quite new.
I heard the underbell flowers uncurl.

You were sitting on the little staircase. By all accounts, a pearl.
I stiffened. Limits were measured.

You were the sum of all you encountered,
become what you could not deter.

We were joined by the ladies’ confessor (and connoisseur),
self-absorbed as a Klein jug.

Who led me across the city that morning?
Behind the railway station, he sat me down at a low
wooden table and produced a bottle. We cracked it like a watermelon.
My Adam's apple bobbing, as though I and the rails had shared the swallow.

On the fence was a pumpkin. I used to think the elixir of debility
was in the potato. But no! It's in the pumpkin,
an octave below. From the instability
of its inner glow, fingers of pulp emerge as if counting.