I have an unsolved issue with the city,

that is, I think that during the day we’re unable

to tell each other everything. I make up for it, willy

or nilly, at night, when the hedges draw closer

and the hills start rolling beneath my feet.

There’s usually a lot of drives streets vaults arcades

also a lot of bronze, made green by the wet darkness

in the rarely mown parks.

It keeps sending me on errands from façade to façade

by inconveniently connected tram lines

and often it spells out the names of buildings and squares

in completely arcane languages.

It rolls me down sidewalks, chucks me over to entrances,

hiding, nonetheless, its inner courtyards –

the proof that it can dream lucidly, if I

clamber where I have to through passages and underpasses.

And then in the morning it makes me laugh

and deride, because I know that it multiplies braggingly

in me all night, pulling wool over my eyes, blaring propaganda,

trying to appear larger blacker deeper

to build itself endlessly, illusively, in vain.