Eduardo Chirinos

There's no cause for vanity and none for pride: it's just a matter of assembling words in lines, then dividing them up (or letting them divide themselves), hoping they sound good or bad. (What's important is that they sound like something.) It's all a question of staying alert so that red doesn't bleed into orange or orange into yellow or yellow into silence. There's no cause for rejecting silence and none for accepting it, either. We should speak when there's noth- ing to say and be quiet when others talk. That's the poet's business, so get used to it. There's nothing glorious about it. The future doesn't count for anything and the past just laughs at us. There's no cause for writing this poem and none for deleting it, either.

All at once that stubborn dog of a heart stopped barking at Lady Poetry, jumped over the wall where the sacred crows of Kashmir dwelt and said: I've come into this world to stay. It can't be, protested the daffy nurses of Pickapoon Hospital. It can't be, the guardians of the public order responded in chorus. All at once that heart stopped leaping, not in his beloved Buenos Aires where he'd mis- placed his violin for good or in Ukraine where José sawed timber and memorized train schedules. That stubborn dog of a heart kept singing in the face of turbulence, never knowing whether the Lady would arrive. He put bars on his verses because of issues with his lungs and thanked the little birds that ate from his hand. He fed the crows as well—"breadcrumbing," he'd call it—ringing a bell while quoting mystics in their native tongues. This is why I've come, he'd say, but all at once that stubborn dog of a heart stopped speaking and drew a giant moustache high up in the spheres. You can see it if you dare listen to their music.

If someone tells you that your poem is nostalgic, take it as a compliment. There's no greater praise. In Greek,nostos means "return" and algia"pain." What's a poem without the return of pain?  If they tell you that your poem is melancholic, take that as a compliment, too. In Greek,melan means "black" and khole"bile." What's a poem without the most pernicious disorder of the body and soul?  Pain and illness.  If your poem is nostalgic and melancholic, see a doctor.