THE EVERYDAY FIRE

by Octavio Paz

Like the air
            constructing and deconstructing
invisible buildings
on the pages of geology,
on the planetary mesas:
                       man.
His language scarcely a grain
burning
       in the palm of space.

Syllables are incandescent.
And they are plants:
                    their roots
fracture silence,
                 their branches
build houses of sound.
                      Syllables:
they twine and untwine,
                       playing
at likeness and unlikeness.
Syllables:
          they ripen in the mind,
flower in the mouth.
                    Their roots
drink night, eat light.  
                       Languages:
trees incandescent
with leaves of rain.

Foliage of lightning,
geometries of echoes:
on a leaf of paper
the poem constructs itself
                          like day
on the palm of space.