This poetry collection continually frames a dialectic between illness and, consequently, the threat of an end, of termination, and the hope of immortality, immortality achieved through the poetic word.
At Zenda we have the immense honor of publishing five poems from The Health of Immortal Beings (El Envés), by the recently deceased Eduardo Cruz Acillona. We add an extra note: the epitaph the author himself wrote for his tomb.
***
SELF-PORTRAIT
To the teachers of the Harvest of ’50
I
I am a train in the early hours
Heading to a Paris
That no longer exists.
Where the rain falls in black and white
Where Hemingway wins a bet
With two unworn booties
Where Odysseus regains life
Thanks to Shakespeare and company
And where Sylvia Beach
Greets a hunchback
In the old Notre Dame
On the riverbank opposite the Seine.
II
I am an Andalusian dog in Manhattan
That at dusk watches a black velvet cloth unfurl
Sprinkled with diamonds
From the already silent rooftop
Of a towering Empire State.
Where I keep an amusement park
In my mind
And the howls of my generation
Haunt me like an inexhaustible echo.
Where snakes feed on works of art
And alligators greedily aspire
To the metaphors of the underworld.
Where Freedom is a business
And the world a vault
Impenetrable.
III
I am an open book to shelter
Others’ feelings
Where to sleep in separate rooms
Causing the blue heartbeat
Of the lighting
To be carried by the serene wind light
And singing the song of the outsider
So that the girls never stop
Telling the truth.
I am a prisoner between two free verses
With their variations and my recurrences
Choosing the immortal potion
Before a shop window full of poisons.
IV
I am a patient in my right mind.
***
HIPPOCRATIC OATH
By Aphrodite, goddess of love,
I vow to be faithful to myself and to respect me
For the rest of my life
By Athena, goddess of wisdom,
I vow to live eternally
In every verse I write
By Persephone, goddess of nature,
I vow to make spring sprout
Wherever you walk by my side
And by Hygieia, goddess of health,
I vow not to fall into more madness
Than the one Afrodita inspires in us.
***
OPTIONAL PRESCRIPTION
Take life relatively
Every eight hours
Do not neglect spiritual exercises
Remove from your daily diet
Fatty thoughts
Do not trust appearances
Of yourself
Do not light candles for anyone you trust.
And schedule a blind appointment
For the next consultation.
If all goes well,
We will see each other again
In fifteen days
Here in Eternity.
***
STATUE INVENTORY
The eyes of statues cry their immortality.
Ramón Gómez de la Serna
There was a time when statues
Traveled in the preferred car of posterity
Looking through the window
As the landscape fled
Toward the merciless oblivion.
I want to be a statue
With no vanity, marble by means
No bronze nor gold
No excessive pretensions
I do not want to bear the skies on my shoulders
Nor to give up embraces
In exchange for a canonical beauty
I do not want to urinate every hour
Nor sit with a concentrated gaze
To think if I no longer exist
Or to admit that I know nothing
I do not want coins in my fountain
Nor to tame its symbolic oceans
Of abundance and health
Drenched in unfounded promises
I do not want to be a fallen angel
Nor to have two lions pulling my chariot
I do not want to point with my finger
At barbarity and injustice
I do not want victorious horses
Proud of impossible battles
Nor omnipresent redeeming Cristos
Nor the purgatory of roundabouts
I do not want to invade rooftops
With the eyes of false appearances
To close the square of the
A circle of the fine arts
I want to stand on the curb
Receive the westerly breeze on my face
And the glow of sunsets on my chest
In a Promenade that bears my name
I want to escape from my pedestal
To flee fame and fanfare
And wander through the boulevard
Hunting impossible aerolites
I want to be a statue
Of principles. With no endings.
***
ONE MORE DAY
The sunset envelops us
With operating-room lights
While night prepares to sleep on the sofas
In a waiting room.
Morning will arrive
Dragging the remnants of anesthesia
That made us fear the best.
Outside, the sea
Beats without assisted breathing.
***
TANATORIUM
(my epitaph, in case I ever need it)
Always
We go away
The best of us
—————————————
Author: Eduardo Cruz Acillona. Title: The Health of Immortal Beings Publisher: El Envés. Sales: All Your Books.
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