The Torso - poema de Robert Duncan
/THE TORSO
Most beautiful! the red-flowering eucalyptus,
The madrone, the yew
Is he …
So thou wouldst smile, and take me in thine arms
The sight of London to my exiled eyes
Is a Elysium to a new-come soul
If he be truth
I Would dwell in the illusion of him
His hands unlocking from chambers of my male body
such an idea in man’s image
rising tides that sweep me towards him
…homosexual?
anda t the treasure of his mouth
pour forth my soul
his soul commingling
I thought a Being more than vast, His body leading
into Paradise, his eyes
quickening a fire in me, a trembling
hieroglyph: At the root of the neck
the clavicle, for the neck is the stem of the great artery
upward into his head that is beautiful
At the rise of the pectoral muscles
the nipples, for the breasts are like sleeping fountains
of feeling in man, waiting above the beat of his heart,
shielding the rise and fall of his breath, to be
awakend
At the axis of his mid hriff
the navel, for in the pit of his stomach the chord from
which first he was fed has its temple,
At the root of the groin
the public hair, for the torso is the stem in which the man
flowers forth and leads to the stamen of flesh in which
his seed rises
a wave of need and desire over taking me
cried out my name
(This was long ago. It was another life)
and said,
What do you want of me?
I do not know, I said. I have fallen in love. He
has brough me into heights and dephts my heart
would fear without him. His look
pierces my side . fire eyes .
I have been waiting for you, he said:
I know what you desire
you do not yet know but through me .
And I am with you everywhere. In your falling
I have fallen from a high place. I have raised myself
from darkness in your rising
wherever you are
my hand in your hand seeking the locks, the keys
I am there. Gathering me, you gather
your Self.
From my Other is not a woman but a man
the King upon whose bosom let me lie.
Poema de Robert Duncan 1968
Nota: “Torso”, pintura-colagem do poema de Robert Duncan - ”The Torso”, é um livro de artista. É dedicado ao poeta Ricardo Marques.