And we love life if we find a way to it.
We dance in between martyrs and raise a minaret for violet or palm trees.
We love life if we find a way to it.
And we steal from the silkworm a thread to build a sky and fence in this departure.
We open the garden gate for the jasmine to go out as a beautiful day on the streets.
We love life if we find a way to it.
And we plant, where we settle, some fast growing plants, and harvest the dead.
We play the flute like the color of the faraway, sketch over the dirt corridor a neigh.
We write our names one stone at a time, O lightning make the night a bit clearer.
I lie down
in the face of what I’ll never be able to say
entranced by salt still existing in this battered body
I bet we weren’t able to name that rock a hundred thousand years ago
and she was rock in each stony fiber
she called herself rock until someone listened and said “rock”
until the silent sea wore away her firmness and made her sand
like her, I break up into pieces
I lie down
on earth
so still
so emergent
so everyone’s
the colors
that I feel
and am
a landscape, beating
submerged in its own echoes
in all our echoes
Translation
Me tumbo
Ante lo que nunca podré decir
Absorta de que aún exista sal en este cuerpo maltratado
¿A que no sabíamos nombrar aquella roca hace cien mil años?
Y ella era roca en cada fibra pétrea
Se dijo roca hasta que alguien la escuchó y le dijo “roca”
Hasta que el mar silencioso fue desmoronando su entereza y la volvió arena
Como ella me desarmo
Me tumbo
En la tierra
Tan quieta
Tan emergente
Tan de todos
los colores
Que me siento
Y soy
Paisaje latiendo
Sumergido en sus ecos propios
en todos los ecos nuestros
Open Up, Genitalia
–Ana Istarú
Open up, genitalia
like a consenting flower
Undo the latches of your retreat
allow
the suffering swimmer to escape,
stop, don’t hold back
your fragile prancing,
open up with courage
like a balcony that emerges over the air
and shows off its geraniums.
Reveal,
oh shadowy well, your mystery.
Don’t halt its sailing voyage.
It doesn’t matter that your goodbye
pierces you like the north wind,
like an icy beam that houses
its splinters in your pelvis.
Open up, genitalia
turn yourself into a waterfall,
forget your sorrow.
Let it open for the child
that lives in your daydream.
Open bravely
your warm floodgates
to this honey ice cone,
to this animal that trembles
like a gust of wind,
to this wrinkled fruit
that will sink itself in the light with rage,
to search like a deer with eyes closed
for the nipples of the air, for the two breasts of the day.
Translation
Ábrete sexo
Ábrete sexo
como una flor que accede,
descorre las aldabas de tu ermita,
deja escapar
al nadador transido,
desiste, no retengas
sus frágiles cabriolas,
ábrete con arrojo,
como un balcón que emerge
y ostenta sobre el aire sus geranios.
Desenfunda,
oh poza de penumbra, tu misterio.
No detengas su viaje al navegante.
No importa que su adiós
te hiera como cierzo,
como rayo de hielo que en la pelvis
aloja sus astillas.
Ábrete sexo,
hazte cascada,
olvida tu tristeza.
Deja partir al niño
que vive en tu entresueño.
Abre gallardamente
tus cálidas compuertas
a este copo de mieles,
a este animal que tiembla
como un jirón de viento,
a este fruto rugoso
que va a hundirse en la luz con arrebato,
a buscar como un ciervo con los ojos cerrados
los pezones del aire, los dos senos del día.
I go bodiless from the sun to the shady
water music of living shadow
through the narrowing vagina
which guides me from blindness to light
under the high echoing dome
in this colossal semblance of a nest
I touch the sea belly with my belly
I inspect my body meticulously
poke at my feelings
I am alive
Translation
incorpóreo paseo del sol a lo umbrío
agua música en la sombra viviente
atravieso la afilada vagina
que me guía de la ceguera a la luz
bajo la alta cúpula sonora
en este colosal simulacro de nido
toco el vientre marino con mi vientre
registro minuciosamente mi cuerpo
hurgo mis sentimientos
estoy viva
grant me an afternoon sadness
turn, tiny wheel of ardor, turn!
ii
the lost look of sadness
synecdoche of a love returning
iii
torrid fist straight to the chest
when it arrived in the stomach
opened itself into ten fleshy petals
and held me back
iv
i had a watery prairie
modest pool
of calming dark rings, rain-damp hair
moving slowly
to doze aware
of the tornado
v
fierce warmth enormous eyes
pure expressive faces
all mortgaged realism
concentration of thought
assimilated to swarm
…wander into familiar
walls
vi
nothing as predictable today as the body:
with warm compresses, with gentle caresses
my breasts draw near the fire
test the embrace in the silence
of this stiff ruggedness you will make defoliate me
I return: dressed
by your fingers
vii
all was revealed that evening
an order never existed
swirling like a sea
feigned a drowning
suddenly stopped on the surface
we saw at last the bodies
but we were going:
profile, back, end of the album.
stiff sparrows pile up on the balcony
and i will not place them in a crate
to carry them away
Translation
negativo del regreso
i
dame tristeza a la tarde
gira, diminuta rueda de ardor, gira!
ii
la mirada perdida de la tristeza
sinécdoque del amor que vuelve
iii
puño tórrido en la boca al pecho
cuando llegó al estómago
se abrió en diez carnosos pétalos
y me contuvo
iv
tuve llanura acuosa
modesto estanque
de serena ojera, cabello llovido
movimiento lento
donde dormitar consciente
del tornado
v
tibieza feroz ojos enormes
rostros de expresivo puro
todo realismo hipotecado
concentración de pensamiento
asimilado a enjambre
..deambulé contra paredes
reconocidas
vi
nada tan predecible hoy como el cuerpo:
con tibias compresas, con caricias dóciles
acerca mi pecho a la lumbre
prueba abrazar en silencio
de esta rígida rugosidad harás que me deshoje
regreso: desde tus dedos
vestida
vii
todo se supo a la tarde
nunca existió consigna
arremolinado como un mar
se simuló un ahogo
de pronto detenido en superficie
vimos al fin los cadáveres
pero nos estábamos yendo:
perfil, espalda, fin del álbum.
Nothing more than a marimba, a joke, a bass drum and the splinter of a scream to put the sky at the level of my feet. A tremor rises settled at the root itself of my ancestor.
Translation
Un eco de un eco
Nada más que una marimba,
un guasá, un bombo
y la astilla de un grito
para poner el cielo
al nivel de mis pies.
Sube un temblor
asentado
en la raíz misma
de mi ancestro.
War is no longer declared,
only continued. The monstrous
has become everyday. The hero
stays away from battle. The weak
have gone to the front.
The uniform of the day is patience,
its medal the pitiful star of hope above the heart.
The medal is awarded
when nothing more happens,
when the artillery falls silent,
when the enemy has grown invisible
and the shadow of eternal armament
covers the sky.
It is awarded
for desertion of the flag,
for bravery in the face of friends,
for the betrayal of unworthy secrets
and the disregard
of every command.
Original
Alle Tage
Der Krieg wird nicht mehr erklärt,
sondern fortgesetzt. Das Unerhörte
ist alltäglich geworden. Der Held
bleibt den Kämpfen fern. Der Schwache
ist in die Feuerzonen gerückt.
Die Uniform des Tages ist die Geduld,
die Auszeichnung der armselige Stern
der Hoffnung über dem Herzen.
Er wird verliehen,
wenn nichts mehr geschieht,
wenn das Trommelfeuer verstummt,
wenn der Feind unsichtbar geworden ist
und der Schatten ewiger Rüstung
den Himmel bedeckt.
Er wird verliehen
für die Flucht von den Fahnen,
für die Tapferkeit vor dem Freund,
für den Verrat unwürdiger Geheimnisse
und die Nichtachtung
jeglichen Befehls.
After I lost my peripheral vision I started getting sideswiped by pedestrians cutting in front of me almost randomly like memories I couldn’t see coming as I left the building at twilight or stepped gingerly off the curb or even just crossed the wet pavement to the stairs descending precipitously into the subway station and I apologized to every one of those strangers jostling me in a world that had grown stranger by night.
