AN AFTERNOON SWIM IN THE SEA
Leopard’s skin stretched on the seabed,
its spots moving: a net in which I lie making drowsy moves
of a clumsy dreamer
stretching in his cage of light.
The wave’s crest – a vine’s braid
upon a head. Beneath is the one
who rides on the leopard’s back.
A knot stringed after a knot: embroidery
that can neither be stitched nor unstitched
but can only be repeated
in a different shape. Where is the entrance to the palace?
The wife of the one who sails from one island to another
tricks her suitors
by tying knots of silver
between the sun and the underwater sand.
Every story in the sea has its double.
A mosaic: an abundance of fruits
made of deceitful glass. Whenever I approach
a solid picture someone breaks it with malice.
A needle of sunlight comes through
and stabs me; I sprawl
but realize that I am pinned to the seabed
like a butterfly: I cannot escape
the temptations of the false images.
All my senses are mesmerized with coincidences.
And my shadow
crouched like a fetus floats
in the womb of the water
as before one of its many births.