Marques's poems speak of tangible things, even if a metaphorical value lies behind them. “Poem From Back To Front,” in particular, can be translated almost literally without losing the value of the original.

I thought the idea of lighting poems like cigarettes was very beautiful. In English, I was able to explore this idea with two different verbs, kindle and light, something that the wealth of precise verbs in English tends to allow more often than Portuguese.

As the title points out, the poem can also be read from the bottom up, providing new possibilities for interpretation. So there wasn't much room, if any, for structural changes—and I respected that.

Nathalia Pereira Jardim (b. 1993) is a literary translator and writer.