Chilean Poet

by Alejandro Zambra

They were like two strangers searching desperately for a subject in common; it seemed like they were talking about something and were together, but they knew that really they were talking about nothing and were alone.

“I didn’t want you to, but maybe that’s how things have to happen,” replied Carla, as though talking to herself. “How?” “Without thinking. Without thinking about them so much.”

Usually Carla wanted to be where she was and who she was. People say that’s what happiness is—when you don’t feel like you should be somewhere else, or someone else. A different person. Someone younger, older. Someone better.

because she had always liked places where she could look without being seen.

“Were you watching me sleep?” “Yes.” “Why?” “Because you are the most beautiful woman I’ve seen in my entire life,” he says, and goes over and gives her a kiss that lasts for three whole seconds.

“They’re afraid of useless things. Everything has to have a purpose. They hate pure creation, they’re in love with corporations. They’re afraid of solitude. They don’t know how to be alone.”

but it’s also true that she never wanted to do just anything; she always sought, and continues to seek, something, and though she is not sure what it is, she knows it is not entirely tied up with success or recognition. If you look at her right, she really is a pretty heroic figure.

—Because some things are both good and bad, as it is with leaves on one side velvety while the other side cuts your palm bloody. They’re almost not leaves at all They’re evil women

If you are in New York in New York there’s no one else and if you’re not in New York in New York there is no one.

I don’t know, we’re never going to know, because this ends here, this ends well, the way so many books we love would end if we tore out their final pages. The world is falling to pieces and everything almost always goes to shit and we almost always hurt the people we love or they hurt us irreparably and there doesn’t seem to be a reason to harbor any kind of hope, but at least this story ends well, ends here, with the scene of these two Chilean poets who look each other in the eye and burst out laughing and don’t want to leave that bar for anything, so they order another round of beers.