Think of a houseboat floating over a sea of foaming moss so thick
it seems anchored in green dunes despite its full-blown drift though
it’s only a contrivance and whoever lives in it is obsessed with the
passing of time: an alarm clock by the bed, a cuckoo at the entrance,
a sundial at the threshold, a timer by the stove, a wooden clock on
the dining table, an hourglass cresting the wall, a bell by the water
clock, and let us not forget the telescope placed between the bottle
of wine and the grapes, stalking the movement of stars.
Grains of sand fall, a rhythm espousing the ticking of clocks: chimes
and bells oscillate, muffled by surrounding haze, and there’s no room
for fantasy: its dweller watches coffee drip drop by drop, is aware
how long it takes to read each line on a page, successive seconds
pervade his sleep, even his daydreams, nothing’s left to chance, only
he knows deep inside he has become a clock within a clock, afraid
of losing track; lost in that sea of moss, he’d still feel the thump of
his own heartbeat.

My temples stream with cold sweat like the walls of a subterranean
cave, I need air, my heart spins, grows into a spiral, becomes
petrified into a shell sealed around a Mayan cenote, a deep green
pool filled with the mute echo of sacrificial virgins’ sighs: my dreams
drown within the ashes of my memories, with dry eyes, I taste the
salt of swollen tears as they flow away in an eternal drip, infiltrating
through the fissures of mother of pearl: valves burst into a gigantic
wave, propelling me out of myself over foam-covered dunes.