speakers series 2

Andel Prochazka

I too have been that drunk who howled at the moon
and imagined the night was appalled,
and all my recompense is illness,
and my mother tongue nearly
forgotten, my country’s name
gained and lost and regained
not by its own hand,
and the mountains black frigates
with my fate in their hulls.
Ah, my life inadequate and still
as the black cup empty on the table,
the black cup
that gave up its contents
unwillingly,
while in the room the cigarettes were brandished
and a woman who had lost her earring somewhere
found it again, cupped it in her hand, and exclaimed softly...
Golden woman, I am your
poorest child, I was hung by my heels
at the mercy of mongrels, find me again,
I am the black cup calling
and I have no tongue at all.