Poetry International Poetry International
Poem

Antonio Gamoneda

I SAW the golden flames descend

I SAW the golden flames descend upon the walls of shadow. This was before the advent of the symbols.

The clay burned in the silence and, behind the sweetness ringed with magnets, spaces would open in which, later, I would realize the impossibility of differentiating cruelty from mercy.

Later still, disappearance was the only virtue of the beloved faces.

I reached an age in which my body shared the light, which, in turn, was both within me and beyond me: they were the fever and the revelation in the instant of shedding childhood. It happened, between waking and not waking, under sharp invisible wheels. Eternity anticipated its doubleness: it didn’t exist, but it was still luminous and frightening.

I was a guest at the compression of the fire. Around me I sensed hawthorn belts and the precision of the knives gone missing in the snow. I discovered a void on whose escarpments extended fields of motionless poppies. I learned to howl while glasses broke inside my eyes.

My youth was driven by technified lightning bolts beyond the flowers in their flaming habits. I saw, inside abandoned bedrooms, cracks through which the reptiles of weeping poked their heads.

I met the cold and, past the symbols, I saw judicial footprints.

I saw, too, tortured bones. Back then they raised in me the great, the useless questions. I was afraid before the stillness of the maternal curtains.

Later I learned the loveliness of certain ulcers and, in the arterial tissue, the piping that communicates both pleasure and death.

I dreamed and the dream was another life inside my body and its plot was about pain and pain preceded thought and was deduced from ailing cells.

I lost my way in this additional creation; discovered there was nothing more than madness in bodies interacting.

I thought once more about the torturers, again I saw

fruits petrified by silence and, between my hands, my father’s teeth (extracted from the humid earth). I had to calculate the value of the black costume jewels received by unknown lovers and, one day, melancholy revealed itself, wired from the heart to the intestines.

I saw poverty through oblivion and also saw, just once, my mother’s face smiling over cotton and steel. Just once.



This is my story, this is my creation. There’s nothing else in the cold bedroom. Outside,
abandoned, are the baskets of sorrow, excrements glazed over with dew, and the great
announcements of happiness.

IK ZAG goudkleurige vlammen neerkomen

VI DESCENDER llamas doradas sobre muros de sombra. Esto fue antes de la aparición de los símbolos.

La arcilla ardía en el silencio y, tras la dulzura cercada por imanes, se abrían espacios en los que, más tarde, advertiría la imposibilidad de distinguir la crueldad de la misericordia.

Después, la desaparición fue la única virtud de los rostros amados.

Entré en un tiempo en que mi cuerpo participaba de la luz, que, a su vez, estaba en mí y fuera de mí: eran la fiebre y la revelación en el instante de rasgarse la infancia. Sucedía, entre despertar y no despertar, bajo afiladas ruedas invisibles. La eternidad anticipaba su doblez: no existía, pero era luminosa y temible.

Asistí a la compactación del fuego. Sentí en torno a mí cinturones de espino y la precisión de los cuchillos perdidos en la nieve. Descubrí un abismo en cuyos escarpes se extendían amapolas inmóviles. Aprendí a aullar mientras se rompían vidrios dentro de
mis ojos.

Mi juventud fue conducida pos relámpagos technificados más allá de las flores en su hábito de llamas. Vi, en habitaciones abandonadas, grietas por las que asomaban su cabeza los reptiles del llanto.

Conocí el frío y, más allá de los símbolos, vi huellas judiciales.

Vi también huesos torturados. Por entonces se levantaron en mí las grandes, las inútiles preguntas. Tuve miedo ante la quietudde las cortinas maternas.

Después advertí la belleza de ciertas úlceras y, en el tejido arterial, las tuberías que comunican el placer y la muerte.

Soñé y el sueño era otra vida dentro de mi cuerpo y su argumento consistía en el dolor y el dolor era anterior al pensamiento y se deducía de células enfermas.

Me extravié en esta creación añadida; descubrí que no había más que locura en la relación de los cuerpos.

Pensé otra vez en los torturadores, volví a ver

frutos petrificados por el silencio y, en mis manos, la dentadura de mi padre (fue una extracción de la humedad terrestre). Hube de calcular el valor de la bisutería negra recibida de amantes desconocidos y, un día, se manifestó la melancolía cableada del corazón al intestino.

Vi la pobreza a través del olvido y vi también, una sola vez, el rostro de mi madre sonriendo sobre el algodón y el acero. Una sola vez.



Ésta es mi relación, ésta es mi obra. No hay nada más en la al-coba fría. Fuera de ella, abandonadas, están las cestas de la tris-teza, excrementos cubiertos de rocío y los grandes anuncios de la felicidad.
Close

I SAW the golden flames descend

I SAW the golden flames descend upon the walls of shadow. This was before the advent of the symbols.

The clay burned in the silence and, behind the sweetness ringed with magnets, spaces would open in which, later, I would realize the impossibility of differentiating cruelty from mercy.

Later still, disappearance was the only virtue of the beloved faces.

I reached an age in which my body shared the light, which, in turn, was both within me and beyond me: they were the fever and the revelation in the instant of shedding childhood. It happened, between waking and not waking, under sharp invisible wheels. Eternity anticipated its doubleness: it didn’t exist, but it was still luminous and frightening.

I was a guest at the compression of the fire. Around me I sensed hawthorn belts and the precision of the knives gone missing in the snow. I discovered a void on whose escarpments extended fields of motionless poppies. I learned to howl while glasses broke inside my eyes.

My youth was driven by technified lightning bolts beyond the flowers in their flaming habits. I saw, inside abandoned bedrooms, cracks through which the reptiles of weeping poked their heads.

I met the cold and, past the symbols, I saw judicial footprints.

I saw, too, tortured bones. Back then they raised in me the great, the useless questions. I was afraid before the stillness of the maternal curtains.

Later I learned the loveliness of certain ulcers and, in the arterial tissue, the piping that communicates both pleasure and death.

I dreamed and the dream was another life inside my body and its plot was about pain and pain preceded thought and was deduced from ailing cells.

I lost my way in this additional creation; discovered there was nothing more than madness in bodies interacting.

I thought once more about the torturers, again I saw

fruits petrified by silence and, between my hands, my father’s teeth (extracted from the humid earth). I had to calculate the value of the black costume jewels received by unknown lovers and, one day, melancholy revealed itself, wired from the heart to the intestines.

I saw poverty through oblivion and also saw, just once, my mother’s face smiling over cotton and steel. Just once.



This is my story, this is my creation. There’s nothing else in the cold bedroom. Outside,
abandoned, are the baskets of sorrow, excrements glazed over with dew, and the great
announcements of happiness.

I SAW the golden flames descend

I SAW the golden flames descend upon the walls of shadow. This was before the advent of the symbols.

The clay burned in the silence and, behind the sweetness ringed with magnets, spaces would open in which, later, I would realize the impossibility of differentiating cruelty from mercy.

Later still, disappearance was the only virtue of the beloved faces.

I reached an age in which my body shared the light, which, in turn, was both within me and beyond me: they were the fever and the revelation in the instant of shedding childhood. It happened, between waking and not waking, under sharp invisible wheels. Eternity anticipated its doubleness: it didn’t exist, but it was still luminous and frightening.

I was a guest at the compression of the fire. Around me I sensed hawthorn belts and the precision of the knives gone missing in the snow. I discovered a void on whose escarpments extended fields of motionless poppies. I learned to howl while glasses broke inside my eyes.

My youth was driven by technified lightning bolts beyond the flowers in their flaming habits. I saw, inside abandoned bedrooms, cracks through which the reptiles of weeping poked their heads.

I met the cold and, past the symbols, I saw judicial footprints.

I saw, too, tortured bones. Back then they raised in me the great, the useless questions. I was afraid before the stillness of the maternal curtains.

Later I learned the loveliness of certain ulcers and, in the arterial tissue, the piping that communicates both pleasure and death.

I dreamed and the dream was another life inside my body and its plot was about pain and pain preceded thought and was deduced from ailing cells.

I lost my way in this additional creation; discovered there was nothing more than madness in bodies interacting.

I thought once more about the torturers, again I saw

fruits petrified by silence and, between my hands, my father’s teeth (extracted from the humid earth). I had to calculate the value of the black costume jewels received by unknown lovers and, one day, melancholy revealed itself, wired from the heart to the intestines.

I saw poverty through oblivion and also saw, just once, my mother’s face smiling over cotton and steel. Just once.



This is my story, this is my creation. There’s nothing else in the cold bedroom. Outside,
abandoned, are the baskets of sorrow, excrements glazed over with dew, and the great
announcements of happiness.
Sponsors
Gemeente Rotterdam
Nederlands Letterenfonds
Stichting Van Beuningen Peterich-fonds
Ludo Pieters Gastschrijver Fonds
Lira fonds
Partners
LantarenVenster – Verhalenhuis Belvédère