Touch these limits

by Helga Olshvang
translated by Dana Golin

Touch these limits and these smithereens, one

touch and the pomegranate will spill its purple seeds,

The heart has outgrown itself and protrudes outside

(there’s no one outside of this “I”, who itself is no one);

lips and lids, and partitions, and spiraling hurt

are no more than a warp,

It has all been exhausted before in a series of steps,

all a redux, an encore, a likeness, in place

of some possible other.