Oliverio Girondo (1891–1967)
Nocturne №9
Alone
with my skeleton,
my shadow,
my veins,
like a toad in its hole,
stretching out into summer,
amid thousands of bugs
that spring,
retreat,
collide,
expire;
in a delirious directionless pastime,
useless,
arbitrary,
feverish,
just like the fever
caught by cities.

Alone, with the window
open to the stars,
among chairs and trees that don’t know I exist,
with no desire to leave,
nor an urge to stay
to spend other nights,
here,
or elsewhere,
with the same skeleton,
and the same veins,
like a toad in its hole
surrounded by bugs.

transl. by Heather Cleary