SEVILLIAN SKETCH
The sun leaves violet rings under the eaves of the houses, withers the skin of shirts left hanged in the middle of the street.
Windows with the lips and breath of a woman!
Dogs with ballerina hips pass by. Chulos in pants glistening with shoeshine. Nags that will lose their entrails in the bull ring on Sunday.
The patios sprout orange blossoms and fiancées!
A cloak caught on a wire grate flutters with the tense movements of a bat. A Zurbarán priest sells chasubles stolen from the sacristy to an antiquarian. Immoderate eyes that heal sores with a gaze.
The women have pores that open like little suckers and a temperature seven degrees above average.
Seville, March 1920
. . .
From Twenty Poems to be Read on a Streetcar (1922)
The piece can be read in Spanish here.
Girondo’s drawings & biography (and more translations)
can be found on his robust official website.
Heather Cleary 