SATURDAY NIGHT
by Cristina Peri Rossi
Translated by Tatiana de la Tierra
In the solitary dawnthrough drifting secondhand smoke
and sidewalks sticky with spit
I go out walking
to escape the nocturnal silence of my room
seeking bright lights
oh, those neon friends who always ward off
my internal wolves
my hungry demons
(my Vallejo ancestors).
I go in search of something
losing myself in the narrow streets round the harbor
looking for company,
oh, the sweet drugs that since Baudelaire
have run along the gutters of cities at nighttime
—London, Paris, New York, Madrid—
oh, the unknown flesh that stirs, aroused by a look.
Finally I find it: some sleazy joint that’s still open
a prison cell of solitary pleasures
a peep show hidden between the trees:
a bookstore open all night
where I can wallow among the books
luxuriate in other people’s verses
and finally reach orgasm
with one of Allen Ginsberg’s self-destructive poems.
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