Homero Aridjis: How Poor A Thing Is Man

I was born on the corner
of Poverty and Injustice

my parents were Dignity
and Maybe-Tomorrow

always at the palace gates
of Madame Rectitude

ever since I was very young
I learned to eat air

and to appreciate the Unseen
in the School of Privation

One rainy day because he
happened to be there

I wet my dagger
in the chest of a general

and spent twenty years
in the House of Reality

now I´m free
to roam the streets

of Our Lady the City
with Disgrace and Old Age for my fellows.



Translated from the Spanish by George McWhirter