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from these invisible pieces of furniture that watch me, threaten me, attack me, take a good look they’re expensive postcards, a lot of collectors would give a fortune for them, they’ll sell like hotcakes in those stores where rich people go and Dona Aurorinha coughing on the stairs with her shopping bag, her two potatoes, her skeletal vegetables and the screws and their thread
    —Aren’t you tired, boy?
    so nice to me, always so attentive
    —If you’re tired, rest on the landing I’ll wait for you
    Rosendo accompanying her up the steps with his polite ways,
    discreet about his illness, and his painstaking handwriting, my father had a nib like that, he’d put it in the penholder and write with it, making no mistakes
    if you will allow me a bold expression of my daring I adore you
    the teacher asked for the names of the kings of the first dynasty and the penholder
    if you will allow me a bold expression of my daring I adore you
    the notebook exhibited to the circle of schoolmates
    —Get a look at this
    Ricardo spelling it out, following the syllables with the tip of his finger
    if you will allow me a bold expression of my daring I adore you, the Mulatto torturing his ears and fighting off the thorny consonants of I adore you, coming down off the postcard toward me
    all those fixes in his pocket, all that peace, the broken-down wall, the needle, the rubber hose that woke up the veins, a stone where I could fold up my topcoat and rest my head
    —What am I going to do with this?
    I put them back in the trunk, I don’t put them in the trunk, drawers and in the drawers no clothes, one last postcard
    Now that I’m saying good-bye to you I’m tire
    just what I’m saying
    Now that I’m saying good-bye to you I’m tire
    on the other side a lady and a gentleman with painted lips like the clown’s, girlish smiles, cheeks that are too rosy, if you put a wig on him
    —Good morning father
    the lady and the gentleman in chaste modesty, framed in a heart of flowers, now that I’m saying good-bye to you I’m tire
    another clay whistle, another trolley ticket, holiday jaunts to Belém and Graça, the gentleman with cheeks that are too rosy
    —Miss
    and all this even though the apartment was just like ours, the same tiny rooms, that is, the same narrow hallway with missing floorboards, Dona Aurorinha in distant areas where spices were boiling
    no, tasteless little herbs, leftover vinegar, remains of coriander, maybe the Cape Verdeans would accept some coriander, a heroin fix for a bit of coriander, would accept a trolley ticket, a holiday, a heart of flowers, would accept this bronchitis, these screws, this solicitous little squeak
    —Would you like some soup, boy?
    searching in the bedroom and in the bedroom a rundown bed with no sheets, a rag doll with only its left leg and inside the doll what looked to me like an inlaid cigarette case, a silver medallion, gold that
    Miss Aurorinha I ask of you the favor of keeping in your possession as a token of affection and legitimate respe t this simple keeps ke of my late mother’s
    my classmates gathered around clustered in astonishment, the teacher exhibiting the notebook and the pen
    Miss Aurorinha I ask of you the favor of keeping in your possession as a token of affection and legitimate respe t this simple keeps ke of my late mother’s
    —Read
    the walnut tree in the playground that I never saw give any nuts, berries the size of peas that just as soon as they appeared would fall off the branches and swarms of horseflies in a hole in its trunk, would you like some soup, boy, and I bet the shopping bag, brought back to life, was sailing about in the pot, the eye that my uncle’s fork was offering me
    —Don’t you like eyes, Paulo?
    so
    —Have you got a fork you can lend me Dona Aurorinha?
    tugging it out of the dishrack
    from the fluted drain beneath the faucet where a teacup, a bowl, the cluster of peas that passed for a glass, a saucepan, a teapot, Yours forever