Granada's palms

to Francisco and Gloria

Granada's palms
are speaking a special language
the branches move in controlled
directions
the direction depends on the clouds
and light
and on how the thunder falls
when you are waiting
and nobody comes to the supper
and on how many stars
grow on their flesh
and on what
Francisco and Gloria are writing
when the bride comes early
and the bridegroom is late

Some say that Granada
is a city of poetry
they didn't understand anything
Granada is like wilderness
it is the place where
poetry is indeed born
wilderness is the place
where the thunder dies
between wilderness and thunder
the wilderness is stronger

In Granada
the verbs in the past tense
are drawing themselves into present
aquí está Granada
los Gringos didn't know
that poetry
never dies
that between wilderness and thunder
the wilderness is stronger
they didn't know
but the palms do and they tell it
with their branches moving
in controlled directions
only poets can understand
why the wind does not blow
into the light

The cross of the cathedral
is sending lights over the city
in hoc signo vinces
it tells us
the cross lies in
Granada's poem
the way wilderness lies in dunes
once in a while the elephants
are coming and they stay before the city
the drums beat frantically
the gates open slowly
the light of the sound opens them
the way the thunder opens
the heretic iris
without burning it

Or how the city knows
to absorb the light
from where one thinks
it doesn't exist
o, how Granada enters
in eternity
in one single day

Theodor Damian