Ah Margarida

Ah Margarida,
If I gave you my life,
What would you do with it?

   I’d take my earrings out of hock,
   Marry a blind man,
   And live on a tree-lined block.

But Margarida,
If I gave you my life,
What would your mother say?
   (Her mother knows me inside out.)
    She’d say you’re a fool,
    Without a doubt.

And Margarida,
If I gave you my life
Literally, by dying?
    I’d go to your funeral, firmly believing
   You’d gone mad
   To try to love by not living.

But Margarida,
If this giving of my life to you
Were merely poetry?​​​​​​​
   In that case, forget it,
   The deal’s off,
   Because I don’t sell on credit.

               Dictated by the Naval Engineer
                      Sr. Álvaro de Campos
                       in a state of alcoholic
                           unconsciousness.

1 October 1927

ZENITH, Richard (2019)