Café
de los Locos
Tolédo,
I've never wandered your dusky arcades,
Bartering with history for a glimpse of humanity
Wrought in stone that is never silent,
Though it cannot talk in the same tongue as those
Who convinced it to assume such baroque forms.
I've never harboured in your ports of shadow, Tolédo,
My throat heavy with your hoard of antiquity,
Your doorways have never thrown their mysteries at me,
In the pale half-light of a wan moon, or
The floodlight of a sky-armoured sun.
Tolédo, I believe that I'm going crazy, craving
A cosmopolitan seat at one of your coffeeshops,
The Café de los Locos, whose patrons I would
Adhere to well & blend into the plasterwork walls
Until the atmosphere & I are indistinguishable.
Copyright
© 2005 Pablo Zula