Tell me something I haven’t heard before
How bridges in Paris are rusting bolt by bolt
and rivers are tired of their secrets
How night loves to wash your body

Empty the words from your pockets
rearrange the stars if you have to,
but tell me something untold before

How your desire never sleeps
How your heart shatters like glass
when you break bread with your father

Tell me how you invite transgressions
and slip knots around the waist of afternoon
so twilight never leaves your side

Weave syllables into a net that stretches
from the flea market on the outskirts of this city
all the way to the back alleys of your childhood

then speak to me in your native tongue
so I may grasp things lost in translation
and hold them like saltless tears
or small fires burning in wilderness