I, too, once lived in a city where cornices used to court
Clouds with statues, and where a local penseur, with his shrill Pervért!
Pervért!? and the trembling goatee, was mopping

Avenues; and an infinite quay was rendering life myopic.

These days evening sun still blinds the tenements' domino.

But those who have loved me more than themselves are no
Longer alive. The bloodhounds, having lost their quarry,
With vengeance devour the leftovers -- herein their very


Strong resemblance to memory, to the fate of all things. The sun
Sets. Faraway voices, exclamations like ?Scum!

Leave me a lone!? -- in a foreign tongue, but it stands to reason.
And the world's best lagoon with its golden pigeon


Coop gleams sharply enough to make the pupil run.
At the point where one can't be loved any longer, one,
Resentful of swimming against the current and too perceptive

Of its strength, hides himself in perspective.