At 18 I was convinced
that he was an excellent poet,
no one had ever told me
but it didn't matter: I was convinced;
in my twenties editing platelets and fanzines
He believed it was only a matter of time.
that any day
walking along some platense diagonal
someone would stop me saying "you are a good poet",
something that never happened,
nothing mattered
I was still an excellent poet,
a cursed poet to be exact
because, of course, I was a Baudelairean
a crazy Rimbaud
I wrote as if the world needed my poetry like water,
left on commercial counters
my loose poems like Indian candy;
At 30 I was already repeating myself
He had little of the cursed and nothing of the clairvoyant
so slowly I went to Chilean land
there I found Parra,
but first, of course,
I stumbled upon the red and immortal sun of Neruda,
I rode a green horse to Lima where Vallejo
made me know the moon,
I was no longer sure
not to be an excellent poet
but not to be one at all, because
It is enough to wear a uniform to be a firefighter
run a jewelry store to be a jeweler
swim across the river to be a swimmer
but to be a poet - unfortunately - it is not enough to have written
not one, not two, not a million and a half poems,
In no national office do they issue poet certificates;
In order not to overwhelm, I will say that this is how I reached 46.
and here I am, sitting, writing
with one of my daughters on my lap
and with the sweat eating my armpits,
If you ask me what a poet is, I say:
He is someone who fights a stubborn and delusional battle
in the ridiculous and blind archipelago
where he measures himself with giants
of the stature of God
who always defeat him under the roar of storms
and if he wins, if chance gives him a single blow,
he falls defeated anyway
thanking
the ephemeral feat
to count his teeth in your hand