(-90)

"He ended up by making friends out of the women he had loved, accomplices in a special contemplation of the world around. The women started out by adoring him (they really whadored him), admiring him (a whunlimited whadmiration), then something would make them suspect the void, they would jump back, and he would make their flight easy for them, he would open the door so that they could go play on the other side. On two occasions he had been at the point of feeling pity and letting them keep the illusion that they understood him, but something told him that his pity was not genuine, it was more a cheap trick of his selfishness and his laziness and his habits. "Pity is being auctioned off," Oliveira would say to himself and let them go; he quickly forgot about them."

-Julio Cortázar, Hopscotch

Promises

I will never again-
forever and-

'

Al fin y al cabo,

todo que yo te he dado

se me cayó de mi' mano'

y goteó de mi' labio',

y no he anticipado

nada que me ha pasado,

pero aquí atrapado

vivo mi' último' año'

apagándome atado.