Your Skull
by Jaime Saenz

for Silvia Natalia Rivera

These rains,
I don't know why they would make me crave a dream I had, many years back,
containing a dream of yours
— your skull appeared to me

And it had an exalted presence;
it didn't look at me — it looked at you.
And it drew near my skull, and I looked at you.
And when you were looking at me, my skull appeared to you;
it didn't look at you.
It looked at me.

In the exalted night,
someone looked on;
and I dreamed your dream
— beneath a soundless rain,
you hid within your skull,
I hid within you.

- translated from Spanish by Kent Johnson and Forrest Gander