amendment

let’s say we did fill the raft with plastic
boxes, earth, jackfruits, audio-cassettes,
pens without lids. words in books
that seemed irrelevant to us then,
or rather, typesetting as a matter of choice.

we’re on the road still, cold

and still nothing carnal to speak of.
following the avon, unable to shake off
what we know, hugging the coast
of this mass of remembrance of a
granite island far from deconstruction.

and the media says nothing.

we say:
these things happen.

x marks the spot. x steals the show.
out, out damned spot, out, out, I say.

just don’t ask me for a fucking
love poem.

I have written
love poems.

the worst proposition I might ever have had
was when you asked me not to step away
from the makeshift compass and
to meet you by the water’s edge.

Sarah Rebecca Kersley is a poet, translator and editor born in the UK and based in Brazil for over a decade. She is the author of two books published in Brazil: Tipografia oceânica ['Ocean typography'] (poetry, 2017) and Sábado ['Saturday'] (memoir/biography/creative non-fiction, 2018). Her writing and translation has appeared in places such as Manoa Journal, Modo de Usar & Co., The Critical Flame, Jellyfish Review, Denver Quarterly, Isele Magazine, and elsewhere. She co-runs Livraria Boto-cor-de-rosa, an independent bookshop and small press focused on contemporary literature, in the city of Salvador, Bahia, where she is based.

*Note: This poem is an English language version of work originally written in Brazilian Portuguese and due to appear in a forthcoming collection to be published in Brazil.