"Water Melon" by Fee Robson Copyright 2007

Superman Sweatshirt in Wartime

Flashing the bulky sweatshirt like a gift,
He makes himself at home on the trolley car
Backbench--buzzed skull bowed and bobbling, “S”
Splayed three seats wide--and quietly drifts off.
Just one more lost Caucasian from outer space
Without a planet to go home to, mumbling
Barely conscious through the light-riddled subway
Rapid-fire. He disremembers where
He’s from. Scrap of frontal lobe shot
Free, his left eye socket is equipped
With metal plates: he blacks out at reunions.
He surfaces to sunlight, eyes shut, no past.
No luck arousing him. The steeled man
Sleeps past his stop and right to the end of the line.

by Dominic DiBernardi

Dominic Di Bernardi has been a translator of French twentieth century fiction into English. He was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts Translation fellowship for The Great Fire of London by Jacques Roubaud (Dalkey Archive Press, 1993). His translation work has appeared in The Review of Contemporary Fiction and Conjunctions. His poetry has recently appeared in Red River Review and Word Riot.


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