The Burnt Men Poem by Charles Andres Alberto

Circles of thought rising through the smoke-
Shall we listen to the the faint voices, coughing?
Drops of water, whispering-
And the wiser posterity, remembering
to roll around in this grave full of mud and filth.

The street lights of dark evenings spill out upon the paths
and drown them in their deceitful aurulences.
A mirror crosses my way, and in it I see a crown of fire,
a wreath of flames hanging about my neck, laced with the pearls of liars.


Oh, and the ashes drift to whispers!
their ghosts are rattling the porcelain plates upon the kitchen wall-
There are these plates that make rattles and pangs on the walls,
and I, putting my ear against the wall (on the other side) ,
Hear the echoes, panting-
But as if they really were begging, or ranting to slip through
the cracks, unnoticed-
The cracks who are tears that leak from the top of the cieling,
and dribble down the cheek, dripping and feeling their way,
as if to say they are channels, they are streets, of vains,
leaving in vanity.

My Lady, the echoes-
they are carried down the wall
on the gondolas in the cracks.
And, I, too am the artist in the Dead City,
treading on the waters painted black,
till I find a Tadzio, and bring him back.