Clarice, my dear: you’re all one and all of a piece you’re all round and all pointy you’re cubic and starry, transparent, opaque. Clarice, you’re a lost case (and a found one too) At times I’ll be thinking you’re a big-eyed and small-mouthed and sparsely wrinkled middle-aged lady And I’ll feel like going into a white cube of a shop To buy a mille-feuille, a tad too sweet Cover it in a wrapper with a thousand question marks Knock on your door And hand you the mille-feuille

Being mindful that I can’t call you “you” And that every time I say “you” I ought to correct myself and say “Mrs.” Though in my thoughts it’s “you” And then I’d go over to Av. Atlântica and take a stroll on a humid afternoon And you (sorry) would be eating the mille-feuille sheet by sheet And after three days In your Jornal do Brasil chronicle Instead of a mention, barely an exhaustive PS: “I ate a mille-feuille, I’m foiled and exfoliated.”

Ana Cristina Cesar, translated from #Portuguese by Mónica De La Torre.

Published in the latest MPT: Presently Proximal Person: Focus on Experimental Translations

modernpoetryintranslation.com/poem/clarice...

#Poetry #PoetryTranslation #Portuguese #PortuguresePoetry