Black Stone on a White Stone*
(For Spanish translation click here)

I shall die in Paris, in a rainstorm,

a day I already possess the memory.

I shall die in Paris—and I don’t run away—

perhaps on a Thursday, like today, in autumn.

It’s got to be Thursday, because today, Thursday, I’m writing

these verses and I’ve hurt the humerus bone

and never like today, have I turned

in the direction to where I am alone.

César Vallejo is dead, they beat him,

all of them, and for nothing.

they hit him hard with sticks and whipped hard

with a rope; witnesses are

the Thursdays and the humerus bones

the loneliness, the rain, and the long empty roads . . .

*In Santiago de Chuco, the homeland of César Vallejo, they put a black stone above a white stone to show a burial.