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Talks go around circulate we all make generous patetic theatre finally we gave up humiliated by a heavy sleep so deep we believe to reborn at dawn /// As conversas giram circulam todos fazemos teatro patético generoso finalmente desistimos humilhados por um sono pesado tão pesado que julgamos renascer na alvorada by Armando TABORDA, in "MANUAL DO DESPERDÍCIO", Ceres Editora, 1994 (1st edition, 2015; 2nd edition, 2017)

EVERYTHING HAPPENS BETWEEN ALL OR NOTHING /// TUDO ACONTECE ENTRE O TUDO E O NADA by Armando TABORDA, 2015 (photo taken from Internet; edited by Armando TABORDA) (1st edition, 2015; 2nd edition, 2017)

So is it a book, this, so to speak?, a murmur, a face turned into something dark that doesn't exist yet that if an innocent hand suddenly touches opens helplessly as a mouth talking with our voice? Is this a book this kind of heart (our heart) saying "I" between us and us? /// É então isto um livro, este, como dizer?, murmúrio, este rosto virado para dentro de alguma coisa escura que ainda não existe que, se uma mão subitamente inocente a toca, se abre desamparadamente como uma boca falando com a nossa voz? É isto um livro, esta espécie de coração (o nosso coração) dizendo "eu" entre nós e nós? by Manuel ANTÓNIO PINA (1943-2012), in "RUÍNAS", TODAS AS PALAVRAS poesia reunida (1974-2011), Assírio e Alvim, uma chancela da Porto Editora, Lda (English translated by Armando TABORDA, 2015)

Will we be able to reconstruct the puzzle of our lives? /// Serions nous capables de reconstruire le puzzle de nos vies? /// Seremos capazes de reconstruir o quebra-cabeças de nossas vidas? by Armando TABORDA, 2015 (1st edition, 2015; 2nd edition, 2017; 3rd edition, 2020) (`) 3rd edition title

CXIV light was up and suddenly the muted lips lit up between light and laughter the relationship is causal /// clareou e de repente os lábios emudecidos iluminaram-se entre a luz e o riso a relação é causal by Joaquim MURALE, in "VIAGEM AO JARDIM DA IRA" - 40 anos de Poesia, Seda Publicações, Lda, 2014 English translated by Armando TABORDA, 2015 (photo taken from Internet; edited by Armando TABORDA)

OUR LIFE IS AN IMPRESSIVE STAIRCASE TO NOWHERE /// A NOSSA VIDA É UMA IMPRESSIONANTE ESCADARIA PARA O NADA by Armando TABORDA, 2015 (photo taken from Internet; edited by Armando TABORDA) (1st edition, 2015; 2nd edition, 2017)

WE COULD REBUILT THE WALL BUT COLLAPSED BRICKS ALSO HAVE THEIR BEAUTY /// PODERÍAMOS RECONSTUIR A PAREDE MAS OS TIJOLOS DESMORONADOS TAMBÉM TÊM A SUA BELEZA by Armando TABORDA, 2015 (1st edition, 2015; 2nd edition, 2017)

Watch me juggle as I walk across the high-wire and turn into a dove as I fall from the sky watch me reappear from a black top-hat under water as I wriggle out of straight-jacket and chains watch me levitate back to the wire watch me juggle the twenty volumes of the Encyclopedia Britannica as I balance Proust on my head and begin to answer "The 39 Steps is an organisation of spies, collecting information on behalf of the Foreign Office of..." watch me crumple listen to my dying breaths whispering of Stealth designs /// CORDA BAMBA Observa o meu equilíbrio quando caminho na corda bamba e me transformo em pomba a cair do céu observa-me a reaparecer de uma cartola preta e como me liberto da camisa de forças e das cadeias debaixo de água observa-me a levitar de regresso à corda bamba observa o meu equilíbrio sobre os vinte volumes da Enciclopédia Britânica como balanceio Proust na cabeça e começo a responder "Os 39 Passos - organização de espiões que processa informação em nome do Ministério dos Negócios Estrangeiros de..." observa-me a desmoronar e ouve a minha última respiração a sussurrar projectos de invisibilidade by Steve BUCKNELL, 2015 (Portuguese translated by Armando TABORDA, 2015) (photo taken from Internet) (1st edition, 2015; 2nd edition, 2017)

in restless stemming days light fragments expose the remains of a country that existed in the wire winds of those times nothing was left neither the voice nor the identity or honour when memory turns off nothing survive neither the homeland /// nos dias que decorrem inquietos fragmentos de luz expõem os restos de um país que existiu no fio dos ventos nada sobrou desses tempos nem a voz nem a identidade nem a honra quando se apaga a memória não sobrevive nada nem a pátria by Joaquim MURALE, in "VIAGEM AO FIM DA IRA - 40 Anos de Poesia", Seda Publicações, Lda, 2014 English translated by Armando TABORDA, 2015 (photo taken from Internet; edited by Armando TABORDA)

"YOU'RE A SNOWDROP IN SNOW" said a man I knew, quite a friend, trying out the phrase. I watched snowdrops that winter. How staight they stood in the snow - up to their necks, their chins. It was the thaw that killed them. When my friend died, I searched his poems for the line. Was there love in it? by Gina WILSON, in "POETRY NEWS", The Newseletter of The Poetry Society, Spring 2015 (photo taken from Internet; edited by Armando TABORDA)

Pull the pin on a pomegrenate to watch garnets explode /// POEMA 2 Puxa a cavilha da romã para observares a explosão do vermelho by Elvire ROBERTS, in "POETRY NEWS - The Newsletter of The Poetry Society", Spring 2015 Portuguese translated by Armando TABORDA, 2015 (photo taken from Internet; edited by Armando TABORDA)

(for Armando) Sometimes I think I can find the far-off island that I sailed from all those days ago... But it's hard to remember what's like to be there, and it's a long way back across a difficult sea. I stumble ashore again. Could this be the place? The shops are all closed, there's nowhere to eat. I'm just a tourist, in my Alohah shirt, toting my camera, unfolding my map. These tumbled walls used to be a palace. A museum attendant sits and snores. At a cafe: Excuse me... is your name Penelope? Pardon me, my mistake. I limp back to the harbor. /// ÍTACA É ISTO? (para o Armando) Às vezes penso reencontrar a ilha longínqua de onde naveguei tantos dias no passado... Mas é difícil relembrar como é estar lá, há um longo caminho de regresso através dum mar alteroso. Tropeço novamente em terra. Poderá ser este o lugar? As lojas estão todas fechadas e não há nenhum sítio onde comer. Sou simplesmente um turista em camisa Havaiana carregando a máquina fotográfica e desdobrando o meu mapa. Estas pedras em ruinas pertenceram a um palácio. Um assistente de museu está sentado e ressona. Num café: Desculpe-me... o seu nome é Penélope? Perdoe-me o engano. De regresso ao porto, coxeio. by Steve BUCKNELL, 12.05.2015 (Portuguese translated by Armando TABORDA, 2015) (photo taken from Internet - published under the fair use doctrine for noncommercial cultural purposes) (post 1st edition, 2015; 2nd edition, 2017; 3rd edition, 2020; 4th edition, 2022)

A longish poem about wallpaper. A short lyric about discouragement in white. A medium-length thesis of uncertain importance. Another sonnet, about scholarship. A couplet of olives. A long narrative about the exaggeration of your absence. Several quatrains about candle stubs. That old sestina on Isaiah. Palindromes about Scots presbyters of the 18th century. Some rock lyrics from Benares. A nature poem about committees. Seven heroic couplets about Art Murphy. Several more heroic couplets on Murphy's Law. A ballad about studying Latin in Latium. A masque for Merceds and her Benz. by Stephen SANDY, in "THE POETRY SOCIETY", Volume 105:1, Spring 2015 (photo taken from Internet; edited by Armando TABORDA)

Today I noticed that a part of me in the garbage container can still shine in the sun /// Hoje reparei que uma parte de mim no contentor do lixo ainda pode brilhar ao sol by Armando TABORDA, 2015 (1st edition, 2015; 2nd edition, 2017)

your face turning from mine to keep from cumming 8 strawberries in a wet blue bowl baba holding his pants up at the checkpoint a newlywed securing her updo with grenade pins a wall cleared of nails for the ghosts to walk through /// ESTUDO DE VULNERABILIDADES o teu rosto a separar-se do meu para evitar a promiscuidade 8 morangos numa taça azul molhada uma velha mantendo as cuecas subidas no posto de controlo uma noiva aguentando o penteado com cavilhas de granadas uma parede sem pregos para que os fantasmas a trespassem by Solmaz SHARIF, in "THE POETRY REVIEW", Volume 105:1, Spring 2015 (Portuguese translated by Armando TABORDA, 2015) (photo taken from Internet; edited by Armando TABORDA)

He wore the night in his fur, sat on a rung between the rails, tail wisping like smoke as a distant train split the air along its seam. Its coming headlight laid down track and placed an opal into each black seed of the cat's eyes, every blink slow as an eclipse. Soon the white light pinned him, the only drop of night left as vibration turned the rails to mercury. But there was no give in the cat, no flex anywhere but his tail. And for a moment their roles reversed, as though it were the train facing the inevitable cat, the end of the line. The world lit up like a page and the train a sentence before the full-stop. /// UM GATO NA LINHA DO COMBÓIO O pêlo veste-o de noite, sentado numa travessa entre carris, a cauda esbate-se como fumo tal como o distante combóio divide o ar ao longo da sua passagem. Aproxima-se com o farol apontado à linha e coloca uma opala em cada semente negra dos olhos do gato, a piscarem lentos como um eclipse. Súbito a luz branca foca-o, única gota perdida na noite como a vibração que torna os carris em mercúrio. Mas nada acontece ao gato, nenhuma contracção excepto em sua cauda. E por instantes os papeis invertem-se, como se o combóio seguisse em frente contra o inevitável gato, o fim da linha. O mundo ilumina-se como uma página e o combóio como uma frase antes do ponto-parágrafo. by Mark PAJAK (commended), in "NATIONAL POETRY COMPETITION", Winners' Anthology 2014, presented by The Poetry Society 2014 (Portuguese translated by Armando TABORDA, 2015) (photo taken from Internet; edited by Armando TABORDA)

We talked all morning about the horse that, if we're honest, none of us actually knew existed but it seemed worth it just to get you into the car, to stop shouting. We mentioned it so often you began to repeat it from your child-seat like a mantra, and you'll never know the relief, having arrived and not been able to see a stable, having stalled you with an ice-cream which you wore like a glove as it melted over your hand, of finding the woman who showed us where the horse rides took place, where you waited so quietly in line, where I stood and watched as you approached the man with a five pound note scrunched up in your tiny hand. You spent thr rest of the day repeating the words "too little" like a radio breaking bad news every hour on the hour. We took you down to the lake and watched you throw stones at the water, watched clouds fall apart and mend as rowing boats left the harbour and you sat still, refusing to join another queue. by Tom WEIR (Commended), in "NATIONAL POETRY COMPETITION", Winners' Anthology 2014, presented by The Poetry Society 2014 (photo taken from Internet; edited by Armando TABORDA)

"Estava à toa na vida O meu amor me chamou Pra ver a banda passar Cantando coisas de amor" /// "I was aimlessly in life My love called me To see the band go through Singing things of love" extract ot the song "A Banda", by Chico BUARQUE www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZWcpEgJZAY