Lisbonne sous la pluie

for Michel Deguy

Pigeons verminously cling
to their sheltering ledge:
an Atlantic sibilance
turns the Latin edge

of this city unsunned:
the music of light and shadow
has abandoned Bach,
fades to muffled fado,

a lamentation of gutters,
of drains overfilled:
a moody ocean condensed
overarches the hills.

After the breath of car on car
the odour of just one
eucalyptus sweetens
the air now the rain has done.

- Charles Tomlinson