By Pablo Neruda
After sunrise how many things
are needed to sustain this day?
Lethal lights, golden rays crossing the land,
centrifugal glowworms,
drops of moon, blisters, axiom,
all material superimposed
upon time’s passage: sadnesses, existences,
rights and responsibilities:
nothing is equal while the day eats away
at its clear light and grows
and then loses its power.
Hour after hour one spoonful
of acid falls from the sky,
as today falls from the day,
from the day of this day.
