Intimate Verses

Seest! Nobody saw the formidable

burial of your last chimera,

only Ingratitude - This Panther -

It was your the inseparable companion!

Get accustomed to to the mud that awaits you!

Man, that this miserable earth,

dwells among wild beasts, feels inevitable

necessity to be willd beast also.

Takes a match. Lights up your cigarette!

the kiss, friend, is the eve of sputum,

the hand that cuddling is the same that throws the stones.

If someone still causes worth thy wound,

to play stones on this vile hand cuddling you,

spits you in this mouth that kisses you!

(Lisa, free translation of the sonnet Augusto dos Anjos

"Intimate Verses" - Recife, Brazil, 1901)