When It Rains

When it rains it seems the room itself turns blue, trembles
and falls like rain, as if endless time coming from nowhere
fills the room, as if endless wind blowing in
carries the room to the riverbank;
turning into a boat, I float
I get soaked; swaying, shivering, I keep
moving; in the distance one can see the line where
the river meets the sea, as if
all around waves hiss, as if there’s nobody around
anywhere as if a profound sobbing chokes the throat
as if terrifying harsh sobs strangle
the room – By what strange magic
the ten directions sparkle in a moment,
as if everything will revert
to its real shape, as if all is a dance,
all is rhythm, all is tinted light –
Awakening and seeing the rain, sometimes it’s
like this, then I pray Oh sky
break up the room and give me more rain!

Southern Heart

We present this work in honor of the poet’s 125th birthday.

Blossom deep down,
mountain tops swaying,
wind stretched out in rest,
the tree stands frozen.

Then suddenly a flowering,
and in my heart’s center
you burn in me, tree.

Nowhere is there rest in me,
I cry out in flames,
a sea swelling in all things.

Then they too – blossom and
tree – twitch, having
already reddened with sweetness.

Crinoline Variations

In honor of Constitution Day in Mexico, we present the work of one of today’s great women of Mexican literature.

Everything rushes
(the fish, the ant)
and I toward the tomb,
my final crinoline.

I run, from the basting and the grammar of my dresses
(great crinoline),
toward the laughter drawn on the dead man’s skull.

“Goodbye,” her final words. “Death to the power of the crinoline!”

I travel aboard my tomb,
in a crinoline my entire life.

“Hush,”
said the fish,
“I’m out of here in a crinoline.”

It journeyed and journeyed,
the whale;
the sea was its crinoline.

Everything rushes,
and I to my tomb
to take off my crinoline.

From the governance of the crinoline,
they take from me an oar
and a chocolate.

Last Battles

Yvette Christiansë
South African
b. 1954

How? Growling down into the gravel
of a rough dream that dragged the
lids off coffins, he stopped
at the grave of Osimandeus. Or
was it Alexander? Yes, Alexander.
But the single howling question…

shaking the quiet lichen from its
settling place. He stood before the end
once more, saw the last hope die and him,
not given to poetry or nonsense, wanting
to sing a lament a troubadour may have sung
to a lady far from butchery and defeat.

Postscript Sent to a Traveler

Ever since you went away
The face by the window has not lit up.
The clothes-pounder and block are mute at night;
The tall gates are closed during the day.
Into my bed curtains fireflies glide;
In front of the courtyard purple orchids bloom.
As nature withers, I know the season’s changing;
When wild geese arrive, I know the traveler is cold.
Your journey will end at winter’s close;
I’ll await your return at the start of spring.

The Lonely Shoe Lying on the Road

One sad shoe that someone has probably flung
out of a car or truck. Why only one?

This happens on an average one year
in four. But always throughout my
life, my travels, I see it like
a memorandum. Something I have
forgotten to remember,

that there are always
mysteries in life. That shoes
do not always go in pairs, any more
than we do. That one fits;
the other, not. That children can
thoughtlessly and in a merry fashion
chuck out someone’s shoe, split up
someone’s life.

But usually that shoe that I
see is a man’s, old, worn, the sole
parted from the upper.
Then why did the owner keep the other,
keep it to himself? Was he
afraid (as I so often am with
inanimate objects) to hurt its feelings?
That one shoe in the road invokes
my awe and my sad pity.

Squares and Angles

Houses in a line, in a line,
in a line there.
Squares, squares, squares.
Houses in a line.
Even people now have square souls,
Ideas in file, I declare,
And on their shoulders, angles wear.
Just yesterday I shed a tear and it
Oh, God, was square!

Is Love a Fire?

Is love a fire? Can love melt iron?
Am I like fire and full of the pain of love?
Out of what is the heart of my lover?
If it were made of iron then I could melt it with my fire.

If it were made of gold I could bend it
with my glow, should it made of flesh
so I see: it is a stone made of flesh.
However, a stone cannot betray me like she does.

But if her heart were like frost, as cold as snow and ice
Then how can she make me hot with love?
I think: her heart is like laurel leaves

Which are not touched by any thunderstorm
She laughs about you, Cupid, and your arrow
She is immune to your thunderstorm

An End, a Hope, a How, or a When

Luisa Sigea de Velasco
Spanish
1522 – 1560

An end, a hope, a how or a when;
they bring behind them what is rightfully mine;
I spend months and years
in vain, and I follow behind that for which I hope;
I am beside myself, and I am looking to see
if what I want exceeds nature;
and thus, I stay awake and count the sad nights,
but I cannot recount what I most feel.

In vain each opportunity passes me by,
but I do not fail to mourn this loss;
I speak with my senses and ask
if there could be a justification for such suffering;
they respond: it is possible, although dead;
what I understand of this, I do not know how to express,
not because of a lack of reason or fortune,
but rather, because of not knowing you in the world.

In this, there is no answer;
not even reason enough to end my vexation,
and since my hope responds so poorly,
it is fair that I respond by remaining silent;
fortune wielded its spear against me,
and the means fled me so as to impede me
from being able to reach the end for which I hope,
and so it compels me to follow that which I do not desire.

Because of this situation I remain behind,
and unhappiness being so close,
I count the sad nights; I can never
reach an accounting of the sufferings I encounter there;
in this, I already fear myself
because of how my thoughts threaten me;
but let life pass by thus, and let it pass quickly,
for there can be no end to my wanting.

Memory

We present this work in honor of the 55th anniversary of the poet’s death.

Late, late last night, when the whole world slept,
Along to the garden of dreams I crept.
And I pulled the bell of an old, old house
Where the moon dipped down like a little white mouse.
I tapped the door and I tossed my head:
“Are you in, little girl? Are you in?” I said.
And while I waited and shook with cold
Through the door tripped me—just eight years old.
I looked so sweet with my pigtails down,
Tied up with a ribbon of dusky brown,
With a dimpled chin full of childish charme,
And my old black dolly asleep in my arms.
I sat me down when I saw myself,
And I told little tales of a moonland elf.
I laughed and sang as I used to do
When the world was ruled by Little Boy Blue.
Then I danced with a toss and a twirl
And said: “Now have you been a good, good girl?
Have you had much spanking since you were Me?
And does it feel fine to be twenty-three?”
I kissed me then, and I said farewell,
For I’ve earned more spanks than I dared to tell,
And Eight must never see Twenty-three
As she peeps through the door of Memory.

Poets Corner

Celebrating a world of written and spoken verse

Female Poets