Destitute day, conflagration of day,
pink pincers of the violated night,
the towering of daggers in the cat-eyed night
when a poignard reflects the stars’ rays,
the feline of night, in the gemstone sky,
this flesh wound of varnish and sulphate,
the rending of a shawl in the gardens of Rabat,
the fingers of radiance a nude body defies:
belly, sun, stars, sex, the rainswept moon.
In our mirror, the gaze of Venus entombed.
With the eyes of the sea the night views us
and light huddles in the beacon of the celestial gloom.
The snow passed below, nineteen hundred’s perfume!
A phantasm of dead light on Via Margutta.