"A SIMPLE HIV TEST. . ."

by Dionisio Cañas
translated from Spanish by Consuelo Arias

 

A simple HIV test, a memory of the luminous countryside, a time before this fear, the lightning bolts of love, the morning after, the glistening dawn . . . all we wanted was a bit of tenderness. Happiness, just one more crime. Poetry instead of theft, life cut short in each encounter. We loved so deeply then, the sigh of skin on skin still whispers in the wind. And this gaze in an empty bar, the sole presence of desire. Love, going nowhere. The outlaw caresses his memories with nostalgia, the refuse of those days, radiant on the map of that city, the only city, la capitale infâme, la Capitale.

“He who does not seize the moment is a coward,” says the outlaw while tracing the letters of a name with beer foam. An old bolero brings him back to life. He’s alone now, the musicians gone, the bar in silence. Je t'aime, o New York infâme.

 

 

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