Poem for the Men of Our Time

Beloved life, my death takes its time.
What shall I tell my man,
What trip shall I propose? Kings, ministers
And all of you politicians,
What word beside gold and shadow
Stays in your ears?
Beside your capacity
What do you know
Of men’s souls?
Gold, conquest, profit, success
And our bones
And our people’s blood
And men’s lives
Between your teeth.

Hilda Hilst
(1930-2004)
Brazilian poet, playwright and novelist, whose fiction and poetry were generally based upon delicate intimacy and often insanity and supernatural events. Particularly her late works belong to the tradition of magic realism.

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