DON QUIXOTE SOJOURNS IN RIO DE JANEIRO

White roses climb the wall of night. 
A pale face looks from a window in the sky. 
O Moon, is it because you have seen her that you are beautiful? 
Is she happy among the saints? 
I placed white flowers in the coffin. 
Are they the blossoms that lie scattered along the horizon,
Tangled in your light? 
Dim stars drop into the sea. 
So you give my flowers back to me, do you, Bella Dona? 
I might gather the petals and carry them to Antonietta to trim
     her hats. 
So much for life with a little negro milliner
In the Rua Chile!

CONVENT MUSINGS

Eleven thousand white-faced virgins in the sky. 
The eyes of Our Lady
Smiling through a rift of cloud.

I see Sister Maria da Gloria’s fat shadow
Pass across the whitewashed wall by the window....

Eleven thousand white-faced virgins—­
Stars from a broken rosary—­
The Southern Cross—­
Thrum, thrum, my fingers on the bench. 
I sometimes think of God
As an enormous emptiness
Into which we must all enter at last,
Our Lady forgive me.

GUITARRA

“An orange tree without fruit,
So am I without loves,”
His heavy lidded eyes sang up to her. 
Her glance dropped on her golden globe of breast,
And on the baby.

NOVEMBER

Foreign sailors in the streets
Are as sad a sight as wild geese in the winter—­

There was one boy with those strange young blue eyes
Who looked at me;
And a long, long time after he had passed
The light of his soul got to me—­
So long on the way—­
Like the light of a dead star.

What makes you look so lonesome, Blue Eyes?

THE COMING OF CHRIST

THE DEATH OF COLUMBINE

DUET

Pierrot sings. 
The moon, a clown like himself,
Stares down upon him
With vacuous tenderness. 
For a moment the night is filled with rice powder
And spangled gauze. 
Then two shades embracing each other
Find in their arms
Only the darkness.

FROM A MAN DYING ON A CROSS

The pains in my palms are threads of sightless fire
Drawn like fiery veins through blackened marble walls,
Crashing with a dull roar
To the ends of the earth.

Winey peace.... 
My sick blood purrs. 
Milky bosoms float through red hair,
Gaunt faces and sick eyes
Beside her face. 
I debauch them with my forgiveness. 
Only her, I cannot forgive.

Moonlight trembles as the silk of her garment,
Perfumed silk. 
The cross makes a long harsh shadow
Rigid on the sand. 
Her white feet stir across the shadow.