THE MAN

He puts on a jester’s mask—

they recognize him.

He dresses in the robe of a merciless judge—

they implore:

“Stop it, you can’t fool us.”

He changes into a fox—

they yell:

“We recognized you long ago.

Enough.”

He wraps himself in Don Juan’s cloak—

they laugh:

“Wrong style.”

He stretches on a chameleon’s mask—

and tears off that façade himself:

comical

lost man—

he can’t understand

that every mask

has a slit

for eyes.

Translated by Olena Jennings