Saturday, August 4, 2012

The Given Is Ground (From Renga)






The given is ground.  You are bound by it
as the eyes are bound – by a frame of nearnesses
surrounding things half-seen  :  thick, bare
calligraphy and confusion of boughs on air :



 



It is given, the confusion of the trees
of infinitesimal particles of dust
flies on the grain of paper, grasses
mouths     blank in the ground of sight :








Confused, you come back, confusion diffused,
uncertain insect,
scabies for each of my eyelids, sword for the iris, bare
scene : your navel is the eye of my tree, wide
landscape of chains, of whips, hypodermic for my vein :
ground, trees, thickets, navel, fixed ray
(Ares and Eros) : the writing breathes – nuptial sea.



 




From Renga, A Chain of Poems by Octavio Paz, Jacques Roubaud, Eduardo Sanguinetti, Charles Tomlinson (translations by Charles Tomlinson).  New York, George Braziller, 1971.

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