The Metro at Père Lachaise

tal vez un jueves, come es hoy, de otoño

—César Vallejo

I step out thinking of Vallejoin that photo, thinas ain his black coat leaningagainst a white boulder,hat in hand, looking into the earth,alone with the sky, asking…Christ, I have no idea what he askedthe sky that wasn’t alreadyin the blood and belly of his poems.What he needed was a bowl of ,a bundle of twigs to make a fire.