Spectator poems
From the magazine

One Day a Man Forgets

Homero Aridjis (translated by George McWhirter)
EXPLORE THE ISSUE 14 June 2025
issue 14 June 2025

One day a man forgets

a sea, a continent, a planet

he forgets the features on his father’s face

the prints of his own hand

he forgets the flash of his eyes in another’s

and the sound of water in his head

he forgets the timbre of his own voice and the noise

of his dreams that wakens everyone, but him

he forgets the suit and the house he lived in

the street and the city that forgot him

forgets love, revelations, death: the mirror

that no longer redeems his image

A man will forget himself one day

forget he has forgotten.