Yekta (France)

The Souls Venerer  
​
(13)
 
a soldier with no number
a unit with no status
I have the foresight of the defeater
the distance of the guy struck off the lists
I am the shot one that flees
from a city to another I still smoke
I have the face of the fear that fades
under the light of a mirador
I only know the bitches’ barking
and factory sirens
I reek of the tobacco of the questioning
and somewhere in my head windows are broken
 
I am the patience of the man that blackens those sentences
the opaque glass citizen
 
I fall asleep under the sheets of an unshared joy
I close the eyelids of characters
blotted out of a scene always unrelated to my story
and I try to read between the blank lines of the roads that cross the mirror
 
my life is but a long Sunday
where I am away in the emptiness of uncaring looks
 
may my lips keep for a while
the taste of the mouths that loved me

​
(Translation by Jean-François Sené)
“Broken branches for the stranger” (Extracts)
Copyright © PETRA Éditions, June 2018

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