from “Fragments from The Book of Decline”

III

and so death leads, death

decides

and so

she and I

and georg

a black ribbon curling

tripping us up as we go

along entrails into the city

of abandoned gas meters, of red stone

and like the sick gaze into our loved ones’ eyes

and move on, gouging the eyes of lethal gods—

and so it lead to growth

everything will be like death—

death possesses well,

leading the way as before

white lips

will flash

on a bare shoulder

and the black mouth of the accomplice

you ok there? am I?

and what if it burns great? the dead ship

sails in the mind’s net, their contact writes that it lies. great.

it’s alright: the white lips and white

speech of the co-spiritor, as a swarm among white creatures

in the old part of the world the Roma wind their way

from the red stone to the black stone. death will

define the borders, admit those who’ve long waited

pressed to time by hunger, they are written shorthand

by someone, no one, her.

we split one helper two ways

between us—the worm.

the contact of lips and shoulder.

the Roma sing: “stop staring, distracting yourself,

stop stamping fear into the earth—

the whole earth’s already contracted.”

St. Petersburg, 2018

IV (APPENDIX: FROM THE BOOK OF LOVE)

please, open your eyes.

in sleep I cradle your absence.

let it be you—

there, beyond the bridge of liars, on the other shore

you enter into heavy water,

a red flag dissolves upon you—

you dive into darkness.

open them and you will see

a funeral procession, with people laughing,

in a city warmed by a black sun,

a clock face harrowed on a tower,

and come morning, you will hear

there’s no one there, as the ice breaks

over forsaken lands.

and we run onward, covering up our child,

embracing loss, our books of decline

tremble. shabbat is here,

shabbat eternal, the world

you want (and don’t see)

begins in love,

in idleness.

please, open your eyes.

there, beyond the borders of day, the insurrection has begun.

I hold the book where it all—respiration—began.

amor, el mundo comienza

Sibiu, 2018

V

the black sun arises in place of the day one, carving the ground, we await

company; exodus—we walk by the threads of light, uncommoned, outplacing in thought.

my phone almost out of charge, I write this to record: the brink of night,

as if sticky foam tangling in the corners of eyes.

we have reached the limits.

none who is loved will open their eyes.

none who has lived through it will be the same.

red faces among jets of oil… scorched buildings…

I knew lands, where from thirst they lick the salty yellow earth,

where they kill without looking at blood,

and lands, where they save air, taking pleasure in the glare of

solar batteries,

and drink chilled prosecco under a rainbow dome…

we have reached the limits.

the last insects at the different ends of the earth pollinate a red brown bud:

hatred.

my phone is almost out of charge, I write to record all this: the brink of night

is the other, with others, and again

the book of decline blasted open,

next to fire.

Bucharest, 2018

From “Fragments from The Book of Decline,” from Life in Space. New York: Ugly Duckling Presse, 2020.

Translated by Anastasiya Osipova with Marijeta Bozovic, Catherine Ciepiela, Julia Kolchinsky Dasbach, Pavel Khazanov, Mila Nazyrova, Eugene Ostashevsky, Emily Van Buskirk, Val Vinokur, and Michael Wachtel.

Image by Antonio Carrau.