I AM MY NIGHTMARE MIRROR

    “Look who decided to show up! The World’s Greatest Bitch!”    Taking a bow I say my thanks. ***    “Where the boss at, Jonas?”    “Somewhere in USA, golfing with the president or something.”    “As if. That old crank would never go golfing.”    “Oh, but he would. Took him to minigolf last weekend and he tried to bribe the employees to let him stay overnight.”    “But... Why would you take him and not me? You know I love minigolf.”    “Ehm... No you don’t? You like bowling.”    “I don’t like bowling, you like bowling.”    “Yeah, and you love to be my partner!”   ***    “You know that hoe with the long pants you were all over some time ago? Guess who’s escorting the boss in this trip.”    “Oh, my. You kidding right?”    “Nope, this gossip is factual. She really is a hoe.”    “Good lord... She ain’t getting a job here, is she?”    “Job for that bitch only in the big man’s bed, he was telling me about her secret skills.”    So my mind turns blank. What a crazy world we live in.    “Ann

  [PT/ENG] Visconde de Valmont... Sérgio Millet ou Carlos Drummond? O inteligentíssimo demônio da decepção, ou o bobo-da-corte a chafurdar na desordem? Imagino se Laclos não foi claro o suficiente com a imagética de seu personagem para que em traduções tão semelhantes possam ser encontrados personagens tão diferentes portando do mesmo nome.   Comme Paris je suis berger, Comme Vênus vous êtes belle; Comme lui je viens de juger; Voudrez-vous me payer comme elle?   Com 41 anos Choderlos de Laclos soltou seu livro como quem dá um tiro. ***    Boombox on his shoulders    Blasting this synth pop remix of a gospel song    Modern day cool kid from the hood enjoys life   ***    — Oh, yeah, I’m 79, almost 80.    — So I’m younger than you, 89.    — You’re younger, huh?    — Oh, yes. Young and pumpin’, fiancée, marrying next month.    — You’re not married already?    — Oh, no, I’m a widow. Widow but not happy, though! — She exclaimed, chuckling.   ***    Old man in the bus, fedora on his head, thr

     “W h en the wooden planks warm up to the warmth of your body, what other freshness can be found in the hot summer day, that will help you ignore your own existence?”, ela recitou do guardanapo. “E então, o que acha?”    “O chão frio ajuda a esquecer de si mesma?”, pergunto depois de um tempo.    “Mais do que um picolé ou um copo d’água, ou a brisa de um bom ventilador.”    “Sabe o que ajuda a esquecer de si mesma? Ar-condicionados.”    “Faz sentido”, responde após curtos segundos de reflexão. “Mas a verdade é que qualquer método de se refrescar num dia quente de verão vai te fazer lembrar de seus problemas. Até o ar-condicionado vai deixar seus lábios secos em algum momento. O ponto é que não há maneira de se esquecer por muito tempo, por conta de suas necessidades, e num dia quente de verão  esse problema é bastante notável. A fresquidão do chão gelado é tão findável quanto qualquer outra ‘solução’ em que se possa por as mãos. Rimou.”    Aquilo me fez refletir um momento mais. Ol

    As the sky gets darker and darker    And the winds get stronger and stronger    I roll down the window and there,    Right there is the only moment a car is worth a dime      And when the autobahn shows its endless body in a moment of debauchery    Under gray skies — the ground is gray, too — you fly, stuck to the ground    Powerful as only god is meant to be    But still a tool for what’s above him      Mechanical weapon handled by a flesh mechanism    Infinite ideas trot like hallucinations over the seemingly endless roads     Chevaliers ready to kill any natives in their path, to steal bison, are nothing but you    And you are nothing but an intricate collection of you      I reek of wine i’m yowling in a hollow saffron road    shouting fuck yous left and right like it’s christmas    thinking about the deer i would not avoid running over    as a middle finger for the years to come   ***    “You remember that verse, right?, from that CD we listened to that one time. I remember li

It’s been so long since I’ve felt That today I cannot feel no more My self is a lead pencil that fell one too many times off the desk And now any new point is bound to fall into oblivion  And I am right. What I say is true I am always right, I know that. I can’t not know that  Not the ant exploring new terrain But the yellowed leaf covered in mildew  Aviators of my soul won’t find new routes I could never be there  *** Another one of those days in which everybody is offline And there’s no “good morning” to respond to And my shell remains a shelter against the horrors lurking outside After the storm, when the sun is bright A morning, a good one, I wish to myself Unbeknownst to all that abandoned me in the last twenty-four hours *** What if you disappoint everybody at the same time? Whoever else will have you with open arms?  *** Hey, you! Hello, what is it? Fuck you!  ***    She was getting in the car through the front door, no mask (get it? so it wasn’t an Uber). Looked at me over the

Hi Hello How are you feeling today? Not much. What about you? I’m here. Yes, you are. Yep. I am. Why are you here? Do I need a reason? (How does one fill the silence that follows?) ***    I remember that afternoon. That strange afternoon when you told me to shut up, to not be a bitch, and I was too overwhelmed by my own feelings to see that you were crying too. To be fair, you were doing the dishes, I could only see your back every time I opened my eyes, through the blurry haze of painful tears. The sweat got into my eyes, and you know how it hurts when you just finish a coat of sunscreen and sweat get into your eyes, right? Double-pain, mourn on the necrotic-narcotic, you knew my friend had died just last night. I know you know that ‘cause he was your friend too. You got his cool Merzbow collection, and said it’s ours, you said I could take the first run 1996 Pulse Demon used CD with me after we listened to it together. You know how to cheer me up, how to make me smile through my pain

     Passing through that special corner where I first saw her    — When I first saw her, when her blue eyes, now light gray in my memory    Directly gazed into mine, and we both felt, I’m sure    That metaphysical heat of when two different paths cross    Where love at first glance takes place and    A new root sinks into both hearts    Of the two newfound lovers    And when our shoulders touched    As the clash of two mountains in which we hiked alone    To produce an earthquake that instead of bringing us down    Took us up to the top, I saw, clearly    The most beautiful view in which she was the most important element —    An overwhelming feeling of nostalgia made me dizzy    And I could see, very clearly in the distance, as the sun slowly set    A tall white she-wolf that turned into ice every piece of asphalt she stepped on    Of ethereal nature, phased through the bystanders, freezing them in time    But as she passed through me, and I felt the ice cold of her spirit    I was n

   October 8, 1999 from Elizabeth Hoffmann, to Margaret Hoffmann 16, St Jame's Square St. Jame's, London, England   Dear Maggie,    Papa has suffered a terrible accident, and is at home recovering. On the way to the club, a car hit him at high speed. He broke both legs and is unable to walk. I’m living in the family’s house to care for him along with the nurses. We’re all OK for now.    Sorry I went so long without sending you letters, and now just show up out of nowhere with news of this nature, but I did not really have anything to say all these years. I haven't seen you in a long time, and I don't know if I know you anymore, or if you even know who I am. I imagine you have already found your Heathcliff, and learned how love cannot be as tasteful and beautiful as we thought it was, or maybe even you’ve found an end, just like Catherine. I can not even be sure if this letter will find it’s correct destination, and honestly, the idea of your demise does not surprise me.

[ENG/PT]   when the wooden planks warm up to the warmth of your body what other freshness can be found in a hot summer day that can help you ignore your own existence   *** A flock of youth at a bench in the park The leader plays the guitar While I sit here on another bench Pulling strings of inaudible bass With only wind and leaves to keep me company   A funny thought flies through my head What if I had a couple plovers on me too And played audible bass For the wind to carry, for the liberty of the self And a purple-haired girl moved her head back and forth like jamming to Sonic Youth   Come closer now and I’ll take off your jeans Shake off your flesh, wrench out your tongue Uselessness of a doll’s life like the root of your cancer To maintain the chaos and give posterity confusion Discover the truth of five minutes ago in the next technology   Russians rape women in the dark dead-end Every broke pothead have thought of selling their off-white fridge Corrupt politicians are dictators

     “There were five knocks, right?” I thought to myself, moving slowly towards the armchair holding my robe-de-chambre, trying my best to avoid making noise. “It can’t be her, we agreed on six knocks.”  At halt my respiration, gazing the door like it was a motion sensor ready to go off, I silently wait for any sign of trustworthy behavior coming from the hall. Five knocks is too natural.    Past a few seconds of tension, one other single knock hits the wood, and I can finally breath again.    “Come in.”    The door opens to reveal a pair of wide-open curious eyes on an exact clone of my mom, peeking her head through the slit.    “Anastasia, where are you?” She whispers, cautious.    “C’est toi, tata?”    “Bien sûr que c’est moi, bête. Qui d’autre?”    I come out from behind the sofa to give her a hug.    “So you actually came...”    “Yeah, the ‘dentist whore bitch monster’ is back and ready to strike again,” and after a short laugh, “I wouldn’t leave you in pain on my day off, come o