from the lone copy of ‘The Malahat Review’ in the stacks of the Balme Library, Legon University, Accra

O let’s sing the rough wine of the earth,
beat the board with the glasses of fall,
while either a guitar or the silence go on bringing us
love-lines, the language of nonexistent rivers
or adorable stanzas with no sense at all.

- from ‘Wine’ by Pablo Neruda, as translated by Anthony Kerrigan. The Malahat Review #25, January 1973.