Listen to J. P. Allen read “In the Café” in his English translation and the original Spanish.

translated from the Spanish by J. P. Allen

Every day I sit in the café
as if nudging time to pick up the pace.
Everything around us is misery, misery,
even the way we talk.

Someone
waits for someone
to show up and buy them
a cup of coffee
(God forbid, for 15 cents).

Women drained from living
with the true exhaustion of the body
but waiting to find a love
that can flourish tender, even
for just an hour.

But then here comes,
appears,
stretching out arms that don’t reach the table,
a boy, a girl nobody notices
because misery let loose blunts the senses
and it’s hard to see through the darkness of your own life.
Others hurrying,
see you soon, see you later,
not one more moment, I’m leaving, I’m leaving,
I don’t know how, but I’m leaving.
But they drag their feet
and wills into the distance.

This great loneliness, this absence, when does it strike?
Where does the drama start or end?
It would be enough to close my eyes
and enjoy watching myself
up close, so close.

And really, who isn’t happy that way,
still as a calm sky,
deaf to the turbulence of blood.
What a restful life. Would I enjoy it?
No, I don’t want it,
I don’t want to let my anguish go.
I don’t want to jail my being.
I’d rather swim through the fog.

I say it to myself:
I need to grow,
superimposed little ones will
inevitably succeed me.

I’m with them, barefoot
and wanting bread
in my small hands.

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