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Translator’s Note Death on Rua Augusta is a book I knew I would translate before I had even finished reading it What most attracted me to the text was my desire to make sense of it, to understand it better, and that allowed me to place personal fulfilment far before any hopes of publication While such a close reading of the text did increase my understanding, it also left me puzzled further: Tedi López Mills so relentlessly explores the boundaries of consciousness – be it Gordon’s, the poem’s, or our own – that the boundaries themselves begin to blur At some points in the translation process, I felt very much that I belonged in Gordon’s tormented world, punctuated by the small satisfactions we had each scrawled in our respective notebooks Death on Rua Augusta is a funambulatory feat; as the poem barrels onwards, it is easy to miss some of its more subtle lyric moments In translation I found myself engaging in that same balancing act: attempting to maintain the drive towards Gordon’s ultimate destiny without losing the book’s poetry, especially its sonic patterning, and doing justice to those lyrical sections without allowing the narrative pace to falter On first reading, I recommend the reader not insist on making sense of the world of Death on Rua Augusta, but rather relish the experience of inhabiting it, enjoy riding the waves of its mania and paranoia, get lost in its relentless onslaught of voices —DS   *** I On the first morning of his new life Mr Gordon (blessèd Mr Gordon) made drawings for his neighbours’ grandchildren & tilled the garden for his wife, Donna: look what I planted today —he told her— heliotropes & roses & geraniums for you, mud for me, words & worms for you, a pebble or what do I have here? glass! a drop of blood, Donna, my blood for you So Mr Gordon played in his yard in the suburbs of Fullerton, California, he played & then he cried, sprawled on the earth with his drop of blood, his