on the back of night, on her back naked
(and)
the space station low on the horizon, the sleeping hut on the slope, the genetic
laboratory, the a + e unit, the bank headquarters, the studio
of bare boards and fly meshes, when the humming
starts up again and the wind after
midnight, the first faint birdsong, stars
still visible, the termite mound
nearby, the silent helicopter
landing place, we
lies sleepless
gender white, skin colour
female -
when the creatures
were still human, inseparable species
language of all -
the grass
runs overland, up hill, down hill, turns to rice
and tea and back to grass -
then hands like tongues, the first
grammar
nine hundred souls, still hirsute
Trust was a smell - as his smell
penetrated her, as he moved her cold limbs and fell
asleep and only the smell still
moved her from within
and this will
in the bones by the side of the road selling
flies and plastic glasses
breathing wall of weave and we
as though trickled into tropical sheets, tattooed into each other
before the dawning morning call - an over-watchful
lizard with transparent, shining dragonflies
sleeping in its neon belly, dragon-
flies, Ginger Bee
eating you alive
I is the bird
gut they have to travel through, sleeping germs, and I
is the sleeper that travels
and the praying
mantis, its morning murmuring of arms and breathing
with the lambent lizard-tail
left behind in its belly,
the handphone transparently peeping
the gleaming girl
driving through the early evening city, drizzled asphalt, then
stubble roadsides, then places
to fill up, tar traps, parcels of land
small as handkerchiefs; she's not wearing her glasses because her moped
kows the way, the moped
sees everything
I licks
it, a thin-skinned, veiny membrane, translucently black, and
the waste tips
stuck in the landscape, gliding past, their flickering
under the skin, fluttering
over the smouldering, sweating casks, I licks
it all, while gliding
past
only matter has
created matter, nobody created we, we first
created god -
for what
gas
was the oldest silence in the world -
I nods, bound in a head-
scarf, floor-length smile in the eye-slit
of the guest culture: tolerance, yes, I
nods (impure), nods, nods: prayers for
a better world yes yes -
we travelled (or rather:) were travelled, someone
paid for the room, gave us a king-size bed, a curtain
of rainy season rustling, we already a jungle
of hair and teeth, in which your back
extinguished the flickering light, the rattling
of cooling fins, the smell of fly
poison, we
are
billions and billions, every cent
of which
wages war
a few words redeem, goodness
perhaps, joy, mercy, or freedom, diversity, doubt, or
conscience or courage - the words redeem
or what they mean, or redeem
at all -
or at least: and
flying dragon
in my shoulder, rose-
fingered
phoenix, in flood-nights it flies out
with burning claws -
everyone related
to everyone, even the mutants
related to everyone
Translation: Catherine Hales