Come to Valparaíso at dusk.
Make a turn under the greening moon
Where the hard sand tosses in blankets of ice,
Where stews sit unattended in windows,
Where feral dogs accompany men down Errázuriz
Like ants on the spine of a corpse.
If you do not come,
These do not matter.
Come to Valparaíso at dusk.
Neruda will be here, arguing God with Rumi,
Whitman will be here, making moves on Lorca,
Who is telling about the time Pablo stole a motorcycle
He couldn’t handle to catch up with a woman
Who wasn’t his wife.
If you do not come,
These do not matter.
Come to Valparaíso at dusk,
There will be drinking, and the orange sea will be singing,
First sad, then rowdy songs.
There will be food overflowing, creaking tables, heaving grills,
Kitchens loud with long-awaited laughter
In new languages drug ashore by old boats.
If you do not come,
These do not matter.
Come to Valparaíso at night.
Meet me in this endless universe, built of bricks
Placed in sorrow, still warm from the forgotten sun.
Come to Valparaíso at night,
Love me with what remains of the light
And remind me there will be a tomorrow.
If you do not come,
This does not matter.
Come to Valparaíso at dawn,
Under winter rain in sheets like the devil’s weeping.
Where boys lose themselves on Escher’s stairs,
Read fortunes in bloody bottles, swallow stars
Until the stomach bursts with glory.
Til the forests wake in agony to lament their carousing.
Come to Valparaíso at dawn,
Where what is becomes what was
And then what is not.
If you do not come,
None of this mattered.
If you do not come,
None of this mattered.
Image: James McNeill Whistler, Nocturne in Blue and Gold: Valparaíso Bay (1866)