Dawn has erased the city
and there is no one else here
the sky is covered by a swarm of butterflies.
Streets, markets, and stray dogs
everything, except graveyard, has been swept by dawn.
My face, too.
But it has not swept young ladies,
they have been walking since last evening on the quay
and retelling old movies,
in detail, as a patient describes his illness.
It has not swept the orchards, under their dresses.
Nor the silk water, under the bridges.
A frozen moment of the chestnut walk
like a pale photograph from the Jazz Age.
Since there is no one else here
the dead have taken our places.
And you only see me opening my mouth
behind the glass. But my hands calm you down.
Don’t worry, I say, one day
you will hear what I said.
Because a bird flew from out of a smoking chimney
I hid with it among leaves
and watched the two of us leaving
along the street that sprouted from our steps.