THE VOICE*

by Rafael M. Arteaga
of the book: LINES OF FIRE

– Who are you? -, you ask me,
what are you doing here?
I answer:


I go from the darkness to the dawn,
from the seed through the flower to the fruit,
everything begins in me and everything ends in me,
I do not depend on your hands for the bistouries,
nor on the precision of the machines.
The silence is my weapon. What are your weapons?


I was before your glass buildings and steel,
I can exist without you and I speak through your mouth,
however, you are not able to speak through mine,
I know the blinding shine of the desert
moreover, the old man who comes every morning in his barge
to take the dead people to the abyss.


How can you measure my words
with the senile grammar of your language?
moreover, do you believe that I need it?


The dream is a break; he who cuts off
this flower returns to the tree of life
to tell me what he made with the earth.



*The pictures are from Intag, a nice place two hours from Ibarra: here is the last paradise.I was there, without nothing to do, just feeling and enjoying the view.