Selected by the Moderators of the Facebook community Poets Responding.
Nit pick by Lia Eliades
What he knows and doesn’t by Odilia Galván Rodríguez
ESPERANDO ABRIL por Elizabeth Cazessús
Niño cabellos de fuego por Brian Schwarzschild
You Became the Seasons When You Left by Sonia Gutiérrez
Te convertiste en las estaciones cuando te fuiste por Sonia Gutiérrez
Sin Razón de Amar por Zheyla Henriksen
[a prayer to the seven directions of Love] by Jenuine Blu
love song to those who died: the AIDS years 37 years later by Sharon Elliott
Que Nunca por Edward Vidaurre
DEEP WATERS by Lara Gularte
I Know of No Other Way... by Victor Avila
Canción nacida del viento by Elle Wonders
Oda de Odiseo a la Sirena, por Daniel García Ordaz
Ode Of Odysseus To The Siren, (a translation by Daniel García Ordaz)
Son plácidos los versos por Gabriel González Núñez
En San Francisco por enriKetta luissi
The Son of an Elotero by Andrea Mauk
The Time Traveler by Eduardo Leon Guizar
this body by Jo Reyes-Boitel
Braille by Briana Muñoz
Nit pick
by Lia Eliades
As I unpick stitches
You hang laundry
And just like that
Twenty years have gone by
It’s the small things
Your transistor radio
all static and crackle
Punting on ponies
That come and go
The good curries you cook
The way you use twigs instead of q-tips
How you tend your little garden
And piss on the passion fruit vine
‘Not on my herbs,’ I plead
As I pick stitches
I want to tell him
how to hang the towels
Everyone knows
how to hang the towels
Except him
But I say nothing
And I pick stitches in the sun
And think about how he thinks
I think
That whatever he does is wrong
Nit picker
That is not me
But the towels will never dry like that
But I say nothing
It’s the small things
That can break twenty years
Or stitch them tightly together
‘Do you want me to make curry?’ he says
I lift my eyes and smile in the sun
What he knows
and doesn’t
by Odilia Galván Rodríguez
He knows
she’s lived
a lot of places
but doesn’t
know why
thinks he knows her
but understands
you can
never know
a person
is a world
complex
as the four seasons
she’s subject to change
her ways and means
not predictable
she’s more storm
ones that don’t warn
come up fast
carrying electricity
their coppery redolence
mixed
with the smell
of earth
craving
water
that is what
he does
says
he thinks of her
but comes across
the universe
a whirlwind
of deep want
almost hunger
for her
the way she
smiles
how it flowers
on her
usually serious
face
the cadence
of her voice
clear and sure
the sharpness
of her native wit
he misses
how
all those places
she’s been
live in her
not only
in her mind
ESPERANDO ABRIL
por Elizabeth Cazessús
Amanezco y la diáfana luz entra por la ventana
La habitación tiene su propio toque de silencio
Respiramos juntos y a la distancia extasiados de besos
se conjuga el tiempo del cuerpo en pasado y presente.
No nos rendimos en esta comunión de imágenes
Volvemos, sin dar marcha atrás y con esa fuerza
destilamos palabras que le dan sentido al amanecer
Un alumbramiento contiene entero el mapa de la piel.
Niño cabellos de fuego
por Brian Schwarzschild
I
Entonces niño cabellos de fuego ¿qué mirada tienes tú?
¿Qué sueñan los niños de fuego como tú?
Ah pues te diré, los niños de fuego,
vivos y suaves / moldeados en jaspe /
los que llegan con la primavera /
antes que el hierro y las armas blandan
una vez y sólo una /
con una corona de flores y laurel /
sueñan
You Became the Seasons When You Left
by Sonia Gutiérrez
You became the comforting chilly wind of fall,
snugging my skin but nowhere to be found
And I would catch you like a raincoat in December—
ill-prepared thirty days out of the month
(One must learn to keep an umbrella nearby)
Spring flowers—such morbid beauty—reminding me
your visit would be temporary like morning glory petals shut tight each fading night
You, plentiful like the sun’s scorching summer heat but missing most of the day
Perhaps, next year I will catch you in an iced cold glass of tea on a Havana beach
Te convertiste en las estaciones cuando te fuiste
por Sonia Gutiérrez
Te convertiste en el viento frío consolador del otoño,
acurrucándome la piel, pero sin encontrarte en ningún lugar
Y te atrapaba como una gabardina en diciembre— mal preparada treinta días del mes
(Uno debe aprender a traer un paraguas a la mano)
Las flores de la primavera—belleza tan mórbida—
recordándome que tu visita sería temporal como los pétalos de la gloria de la mañana cerrada herméticamente cada noche que desvanecía
Tú, abundante como el calor abrasador del sol de verano, pero desaparecido la mayor parte del día
Tal vez, en el año por venir, te atraparé
en un vaso de té helado en una playa de la Havana
Sin Razón de Amar
por Zheyla Henriksen
CANTO I
Desde la grande inmensidad
De nuestro espíritu
Me duele tu amor
Es limón exprimido
Jugo que se impregna
En la garganta
Al momento que estoy contigo
Y se queda el recuerdo
En los sentidos
Es ese gusto amargo querendón
Ese amor es hostia inalcanzable
Del niño que aún no ha pecado
Y que quiere comulgar
Sin haberse confesado
Mi encuentro contigo
Enciende la llama amortiguada
Que al verse nuestras almas
Comienza como un fénix
A crecer de las cenizas
Es pecado no consumado
Es dolor y canción
CANTO II
Acércate ya al cáliz
Al elixir de los dioses
Porque sé que inexorablemente
Eres mío sin tú saberlo
Reconócete en mí
Yo sé que lo haces
Pero el miedo te impide
Explorar lo ajeno
CANTO III
Quiéreme sin temor
Yo guardaré el recuerdo
Que en mis noches solitarias
Me cantaré en el sueño
Porque
Tu amor es como el rocío
Silencioso de la mañana
Me refresca cuando cae
Y al esfumarse quedo sedienta
CANTO IV
Bendito este amor
Que me hace reconocer
Que esta alma se enreda
En penurias terrenales
Que me hace olvidar
Que hay un Dios
Es la prueba de fuego
Donde se mata el alma
Es el cuerpo reivindicándose
Ese amor está allí
Y yo soy el sediento
Que no puede mojarse
Los labios de tu agua
Es bendición y pecado
Es alma y cuerpo
Es crucifixión y redención
[a prayer to the seven directions of Love]
by Jenuine Blu
by Sharon Elliott
there must be a great party
wherever it is you have gone
to put your feet up
cemetery disco
for a dance undone
we all came of age
in reckless times
that made safety
a guarantee
wasted on ignorance
sitting ducks
in the shooting gallery of
a forsaken arcade
we never saw your faces
missing in action
caught unaware
what was being sold distorted
no rainbow promises
we passed you by
lickety split
not stopping
to count the bodies
erased the blackboard
chalk dust
blown by a cruel wind
I forgot to revisit those days
their aching losses
remain
unknown emptiness
that won’t be filled
anything you may have said or done
irretrievable
departed for a distant land
of sand dunes
rolling breakers
and slack tides
I miss you
Que Nunca
por Edward Vidaurre
Que nunca se cansen tus ojos de los míos. Ni tus labios de los míos. Ni tu piel sobre mi piel en otoño. Ni el nido de el cenzontle en tu árbol. Nunca pierdas el amor por el diseño de tu cara cuando seas vencida por el sueño. Ni por el ruido de mi garganta cuando duermo. Ni por la tortuga que no se apura. Nunca dejes que la sed te cause ansiedad. Ni que el calor de junio te borre la sonrisa. Nunca dejes caer mis palabras de amor al olvido. Ni mis besos al la oscuridad del mar inmenso. Ni dejes que las impresiones de mis dedos sobre tus caderas después de hacer el amor se desaparescan. Nunca dejes que las canas de tu pelo escondan el color rosa de tus mejillas cuando tengas pena. Que nunca te de pena. Nunca sufras por el amor. Ni por mi adios. Nunca dudes de mi amor en el libro de poemas que escribiré con la saliva de tu último beso.
DEEP WATERS
by Lara Gularte
We stare at the great sea,
the moon, gold dust
on slate-black rippling waves.
For love vows
in a rite by water
we enter the surf.
Like two cosmic fish
we swim in uncharted depths,
taste the wild flavor of the sea,
and in a wet embrace
make silent promises.
O mariner man of mine,
together you and I
reach ocean bottom, and
discover oysters without pearls.
Barren of treasure
from this dead sea,
our breath used,
our lungs to bursting,
we pour ourselves back on shore,
our skin turning to scales.
Fish breath.
First published in Days Between Dancing by “The Poet’s Corner Press.”
I Know of No Other Way...
by Victor Avila
I know of no other way to love you
but with words and kisses
and I want to know of no other way.
For in those moments of solitude and silence
when despair and melancholy shadows
come to overwhelm me
I think of you.
The beauty of your breasts delight me
and my lonely hands seek you in the ravenous moonlight.
My desire for you cannot be quenched
or the infinity of its fire extinguished.
Your thighs are an amorous map
that I want to return to.
They are a harbor of my remembrances.
No, I know of no other way to love you.
And yes, I have loved others
but all of them are passengers on somber trains
traveling through the fog of loss and oblivion.
I do not see them.
In this part of our story
we become the glad echoes of each others eyes.
In this part of our story
you are asleep beside me but it is I who feel
that I am in the midst
of the most iridescent of dreams.
I know of no other way to love you.
And oh, how I love you-
for you are an anchor of phosphorus
that illuminates the darker places of my soul.
And your kisses of jade and amethyst
are what I remember when I leave you.
Sometimes in your presence,
when you are not looking, I temble
fearing that I love you too much.
And yes, fearing that the day might come
when I will lose you.
But for now,
my fever in its restlessness
knows tranquility.
I am consoled that you are in my arms
and in the shelter of my embrace, both quiet and still.
For I know of no other way to love you
but with words and kisses.
I know of no other way.
Canción nacida del viento
by Elle Wonders
Camíname a través de un campo de hierba alta
y traeremos de vuelta los días que perdimos.
Cántame cuando las palomas estén arrullando
y el sonido flotará a través de mis pensamientos.
Llévame a través de un crepúsculo de verano
y te mostraré las estrellas que brillan.
Recuérdame cómo bailan nuestros rayos de luna
e intentaremos nuevamente. Nos iremos esta noche.
Si me muestran el camino hacia el delta del río,
podemos detenernos en algún lugar del camino.
El viento llevará nuestras canciones de búsqueda
y marcaremos el lugar en nuestro mapa.
“Oda de Odiseo a la Sirena”
por Daniel García Ordaz
¿Dónde estás?
Ayer te busqué,
te hallé,
te perdí.
Hoy te buscaré otra vez.
Anoche te busque en mis brazos,
tan fuera de alcance como
la bicicleta de mi niñez—
hace mucho abandonada, jamás olvidada.
Te busqué en el eterno rugir
de tus caricias marinas
sobre las rocas
de mis memorias.
Remo y remo sin cesar
hasta que el latir en mi pecho
cae triste y silencioso,
débil sobre tu ancho mar.
Anoche escuché tu canto
en los vientos del verdor,
en los aires rumorosos sobre el abismo azul
suspiros que iluminaron mi paladar
con sabor a tí.
Extraño los murmullos
que dejaste como un eco dormilón
en el hueco de mi corazón.
Me dejaste como navegante sin estrella,
vagando hacia el horizonte gris,
extraviado, aislado, abandonado.
Ayer te busqué,
te hallé,
te perdí
Hoy te buscaré otra vez
aunque sigas enviando
tus olas de besos a dioses lejanos
chocando saludos
como holas de adiós.
Ode Of Odysseus To The Siren
(a translation by Daniel García Ordaz)
Where are you?
Yesterday I sought you,
I found you
I lost you.
Today I shall seek you again.
Last night I sought you in my arms
as far from my reach as
the bicycle of my childhood—
long ago abandoned, never forgotten.
I looked for you in the eternal roar
of your marine caresses
over the rocks
of my memories.
I row and row incessantly
Until the beating in my chest
Falls sad and silent,
Debilitated over your wide sea.
Last night I heard your song
in the winds of the green,
in the gossiping airs over the blue abyss
sighs that illuminated my palate
with flavor of you.
I miss the murmurs
that you left like a sleepy echo
in the hollow of my heart.
You left me as a starless navigator,
wandering toward the gray horizon,
lost, isolated, abandoned.
Yesterday I searched for you,
I found you,
I lost you
Today I shall look for you again
even as you keep sending
waves of kisses to distant gods,
greetings crashing
like waves of hello/goodbye.
Love
By José Héctor Cadena
Éramos lobos devorándonos con sed de amor
Y aun así, sin saber amar
split between wanting to
exist in your afterthoughts as you
act out the movements that might remind you
of my blindness and your blindness of the past
no longer a mixture of
when weekends seemed longer
And people talk up weaving that we became
Oil-n-water, a treasure of unresolved potential-unknown
Love,
Son plácidos los versos
por Gabriel González Núñez
Esta noche son plácidos los versos que me vienen, porque a mi lado te tengo.
Y creo escuchar, en la estrechez de la cama que compartimos,
nuestros corazones palpitar al unísono.
Y así escucho a mi alma pronunciar tu nombre.
Y en mi alma resuena el timbre de tu sentir, el murmullo de tu alegría
De tu alegría que es vida en el valle del letargo.
En San Francisco
por enriKetta luissi
en esta noche de luna partida en dos
el círculo busca su simetría
su corazón completo
como yo te busco en esta ciudad de puentes heridos
en esta noche de luna partida en dos
ando los pasos de los muertos
¿cómo decirte que me han caído de golpe los años y
no me queda mas que este cosquilleo incómodo
por las mañanas?
en esta noche de luna partida en dos
el alma calcetines en la secadora
The Son of an Elotero
by Andrea Mauk
After all these years,
and much to my surprise,
you tell me you're
the son of an elotero.
Childhood memories dance in your eyes,
of the home you left behind.
Mom sweating over the grill,
smell of sweet-fired kernels
adrift on fall breezes,
dad packing his cart
with crema y mayonesa,
chile y queso. Never butter.
You speak of your mom's family,
indigenous features, Roman noses.
Purépecha
who won't back down.
Strong hands made for crafting metal.
Soft heart that hears music
in the flourish of hummingbird wings.
History held in the chisel of your cheek bones,
but as truth turns to legend,
some parts are imagined,
links lost to time and distance.
En el Yucatán, you say
the food is more Caribbean,
like mine,
but I say it's also ancient, Mayan,
Dutch, Lebanese, Unique.
Like habanero and sour orange,
things are always more mixed
than we'd like to admit, and
we always agree
to disagree.
In your state,
your father's relatives
shave kernels from cobs,
tender ears,
preserving husks,
as green as their eyes.
Beguiling rosy complexions
don't detract from
uchepa making skills.
Your cousins serve as proof
that your dad's lineage is a mystery.
The pig is prized, his lard lauded.
Your dad and his brothers have
a well-kept methodology
of fire and frying pan.
You explain how the chiles,
guajillos, chilacas and chiltepiquín,
fresh roasted, carefully ground
create depth of flavor.
Your carnitas and my pernil,
my habichuelas and your frijoles
are best shared with fresh tortillas
and homemade salsa.
He went away in a flight of fancy,
your elotero, viajero, distante,
back to the mountains of his youth,
left you to be the man of the family he created.
No thought that you would want one of your own.
Squandered his candy money on dreams.
Returned infrequently,
not noticing how you all had grown..
When I first met you,
you told of his distance,
your anger palpable,
mixed with distrust,
a cat-like skiddishness,
your sadness...
unspoken.
After all these years,
you have begun taking trips
to those green mountains of childhood,
the strumming of guitars,
your abuelos far-off voices
calling you home.
Forging deep connections,
uncovering a patchwork of identity
straddled between cultures,
woven with yarns
of here and there.
In the graying of your temples,
I feel calmness.
In the strength of your hands,
I feel warmth.
In the light of your eyes,
I see strains of love
rekindling with the idea
of your elotero man.
I worry that you, too, will become
a viajero, extranjero,
like your dad,
and I know that if and when you do,
I will still love you
and forever long
for the way
we always agree
to disagree.
The Time Traveler
by Eduardo Leon Guizar
It is evident that of the day, or of the night, light bends in your grace
Where worlds which brim fantastically on eyes pure as glass
Take, send away anchors of reality for this space
This distance transcends the concept of a soul’s place
It was never my immortal self, never rested inside nor near me
But found me in your unmatched palace of decadence and lace
Thatched in weaves of silk and strings of lip’s embrace
In waves stretching out upon the shore of a secret sea
And this portal I take, from the desert into the oasis
Of your unwavering beauty, removes the very abstract
that is time
this body
by Jo Reyes-Boitel
I carry my own story within me.
Bound.
Bound.
Beautiful stones
embedded under the muscles of my back.
A spine nestled within
that supports all of me
but asks that I hold my inheritance,
good or bad.
This body
made to take and take
what others would have me hold.
There are spider veins falling across my breasts
My legs are in earthquakes
varicose veins, deep and full,
riding through
and my bones miss each other at the joints
clipping at the ends of bone.
My ankles pop.
And my stomach quivers
and my hands will not close
and still here,
I offer more.
[breath]
[breath]
This life this life this life – held together by pins.
I walk slow.
I am holding what all that I have been asked to hold.
[breath]
This is tiring.
[breath]
[breath]
I deny myself this body.
This body that carries me.
I am connected to this earth.
I am connected to this place.
Like the shape of a leaf’s shadow against my skin.
Like the shadow of clouds on the water below.
A birthmark. A legacy of what has survived.
I am connected to this earth.
I am connected to this place.
My feet planted here – though I was raised an exile.
I move like the ocean.
And yet this water is cradled in earth.
My people come from water.
Some generations living their whole lives swimming
toward land they will never witness.
Sometimes we spend so much time in water
we forget how to walk.
But the journey has been for generations.
I am connected to this earth.
I am connected to this place.
And I am learning to love this body.
This body that carries me.
It is a birthmark of survival.
I write myself into being.
I say this is me.
This is me.
Braille
by Briana Muñoz
I have become obsessed with his hands
I often sit and day dream about them
I have seen how they work against my skin
As he slowly slides them across my cheek
And looks at me like he’s never seen such a thing
I imagine his hands move the same way across
His leather-bound journals
Marking his pages with the same amount of passion
Descriptions of every disturbing thought that fill the nooks of his brain
With a pen in hand,
He turns my body into prose
Creates my anatomy into a Spenserian sonnet
He writes of my movements
But crumbles the pages and throws them away
I accept my words do no justice
Of explaining his existence
Meet the Poets
Nit pick by Lia Eliades
What he knows and doesn’t by Odilia Galván Rodríguez
ESPERANDO ABRIL por Elizabeth Cazessús
Niño cabellos de fuego por Brian Schwarzschild
You Became the Seasons When You Left by Sonia Gutiérrez
Te convertiste en las estaciones cuando te fuiste por Sonia Gutiérrez
Sin Razón de Amar por Zheyla Henriksen
[a prayer to the seven directions of Love] by Jenuine Blu
love song to those who died: the AIDS years 37 years later by Sharon Elliott
Que Nunca por Edward Vidaurre
DEEP WATERS by Lara Gularte
I Know of No Other Way... by Victor Avila
Canción nacida del viento by Elle Wonders
Ode Of Odysseus To The Siren, (a translation by Daniel García Ordaz)
Son plácidos los versos por Gabriel González Núñez
En San Francisco por enriKetta luissi
The Son of an Elotero by Andrea Mauk
The Time Traveler by Eduardo Leon Guizar
this body by Jo Reyes-Boitel
Braille by Briana Muñoz
Galván Rodríguez has worked as an editor for various print media such as Matrix Women's News Magazine, Community Mural's Magazine, and Tricontinental Magazine in Havana, Cuba. She is currently, the editor of Cloud Women’s Quarterly Journal online; facilitates creative writing workshops nationally, and is director of Poets Responding to SB 1070, and Love and Prayers for Fukushima, both Facebook pages dedicated to bringing attention to social justice issues that affect the lives and wellbeing of many people and encouraging people to take action. Her poetry has appeared in numerous anthologies, and literary journals on and offline.
As an activist, she worked for the United Farm Workers of America AFL-CIO, The East Bay Institute for Urban Arts, has served on numerous boards and commissions, and is currently active in Women’s organizations whose mission it is to educate around environmental justice issues and disseminate an indigenous world view regarding the earth and people’s custodial relationship to it. Odilia Galván Rodríguez has a long and rich history of working for social justice in solidarity with activists from all ethnic groups.
When I’m not writing poetry or working on my novel, I spend my time teaching, painting, reading, or exploring the world and its many cultures. https://ellewonders.com
Currently, she is moderating Facebook’s Poets Responding, submitting Legacy / Herencia for publication, working on her manuscript, Sana Sana Colita de Rana, and completing her novel, Kissing Dreams from a Distance. Her bilingual poem “Super Pancho from the Land of Maíz” with artwork by Victor Ochoa and Spanglish translation by Francisco J. Bustos is forthcoming in AlternaCtive PublicaCtions. Her bilingual poem, “You Became the Seasons When You Left” / “Te convertiste en las estaciones cuando te fuiste,” appears in her manuscript, Sana Sana Colita de Rana.
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