Six Translations from “The Keeper”

I segue real hard. (Alberto Caeiro)

I never kept agaric de-ribbed baños,
but such nonce thoughts
arrive on winds of Mace
           whispering: GORD-ass.

I know that iconic wind, that sun.
My soul drops tears as mini-alms
           in that pasture’s grunting pocket.

And yes, it grows cold at the end of the plain.
A butterfly tries to open the window
           at the end of the plain.

O Buffalo Bayou (I stack the last O’s).
O Natural Light.
O fourteen umps
of e-comm.

O Rebanho de Rebanhos. (Alberto Caeiro)

When it grows cold deep in the plains
When it grows cold          deep in the plains
      Watching sheep and seeing
ideas Watching            sheep and seeing

                      The sheep are my thoughts:
 That knitted hills, valleys, plains
are knitted hills valleys, plains sun-turning

              Or, watching ideas and seeing sheep
(Or, to be all my sheep walking
     Scattering over the hillside
             As ten happy things at the same time)
As ten costume dandy pelts straddles

                                   I never            kept sheep
                                I’m keeper      of sheep

                      “Hey, keeper of sheep,
           Yes, you, on the other side
of the road                    sun-turning:

What is the meaning of the wind that passes?
   What sheeping meaning to the wind
that passes?
What will sheep keep
                                   knowing of wind?”

Toad Sensações. (Alberto Caeiro)

The keeper guards the door
           with rebar.

The sheep are his pens.
His thoughts are Mentos.

For example, to think of a flower.

For example, to eat
           a fruit
           (and vice versa).

His eyes and his ears
            (...you know).

Epigraph. (Mario de Sá-Carneiro)

The catastrophe halo
is deserted,
mirrored.

I fuck Myself.

Who am I?

Here, everything’s
gone... combination
has died

In stylized
shallows —

even alteration is a ruin...

A dull soybean dilutes me
            In the kitchen...

Não. (Mario de Sá-Carneiro)

...

walking past the sheepish
                               skyscraper

                                    rising
                                                 mirrored

                       doors spinning
         valets idle

minimal
            founts dried up, bleached—

               a shriveled mauve balloon

blue wall of curved
                                   topiary
                                                 sepulchral...

...

Sea brahmin, you mope for us. (Mario de Sá-Carneiro)

Oh to stick myself okay and
tame between covers,

and not do any more nodding.
Yellow wool. Light of fluff.

That my door stay shut.
That I always have at my bedside

a bowl of cakes, some liver,

laver, Cali feta,
a dove, a bottle

of Madeira, a “cute
Enya sim,” some human

Garfield maid art

∩

Mário de Sá-Carneiro (1890-1916) was a Portuguese poet and writer. With Fernando Pessoa, he founded Orpheu, the central journal of Portuguese modernism. 

Alberto Caeiro (1889-1915) was a fictional shepherd and a heteronym of Fernando Pessoa. 

Joshua Wilkerson is the author of Meadowlands/Xanadu/American Dream and the co-editor of Beautiful Days Press and the journal Works & Days. Recent work can be found in Tagvverk, Annulet Poetics, New Mundo, Noir Sauna, and Volume Poetry.