Three Visions in Memphis
The world is an open window in Memphis : where the weary, half-washed tidiness can be seen
sanding off the edges there everything is what it seems but there is no greater miracle on these
streets than making the evident become visible.
There is a crack in everything / that’s how the light gets in and in the Aberrations and Idleness of Form
the pattern’s bull-headed recurrence foreseen in the order of discourse im-pression
far-off transfixing ray imposes its framing in the instant’s illusory fixity :
the world is not that window despite how perspective denies this premise.
referential landmark : not the window the scope’s recharged stupor shrunken in the frame
non-transcendental reality’s camera readiness this is Memphis : the zero point of desire.
Tres visiones en Memphis
El mundo es una ventana abierta en Memphis : desde ella es posible percibir la deslavada pulcritud
con que el hastío trabaja las esquinas Cada cosa es ahí lo que parece pues no hay en esas calles más
milagro que el de hacerse visible lo evidente
hay una grieta en todo / y es así como la luz se cuela y en el ocio de la forma la empecinada
recurrencia de un patrón previsto en el orden del discurso pre-sentido sujeto al marco que el rayo
aquel traspasa en la ilusoria fijeza del instante : el mundo no es esa ventana
si bien la perspectiva desmiente tal premisa
marco referencial : no la ventana el recargado sopor del ámbito que constriñe la moldura la fotogenia
de una realidad intranscendente esto es Memphis : el grado cero del deseo
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Víctor Cabrera is an author and editor originally from the Chiapas State of Mexico. He has published several volumes of poetry including Signos de traslado (2007), Un jardín arrasado de cenizas (2014), Guijarros (2014), and Mística del hastío (2017) as well as the collection of short stories Episodios célebres (2006). He is a recipient of the National Foundation for Culture and the Arts (FONCA) grant, and his works have been featured in several anthologies of contemporary Mexican poetry.
James Richie holds a PhD in Humanities from the University of Louisville. He translates, primarily poetry and plays, from Spanish, Russian, and Italian into English, and he researches in the fields of film, literature, and translation. His translations have been featured in Latin American Literature Today, Anomaly, and the Journal of Italian Translation. His research has appeared in Translation Review and Vernacular: New Connections in Language, Literature, and Culture.