Thinking

Pura López-Colomé, AURORA, published 2007 by Shearsman Books in the UK. Trans. Jason Stumpf.

A BIEN RESGUARDO

I

El otro mundo.

La luz me abrió sus puertas
cuando quería seguir el cauce
de este sueño
grave, ensombrecido,
en dirección contraria al día,
Una dorada catarara,
agujas finas,
panetraba mi ceguera:
polvo de cristal,
palabra nunca vista,
aurora.
Nuevo el peso.
Nuevo el brillo.
Regalo de bodas colectivas,
paraíso en la manzana de la ciencia,
jugo verdadero,
gozo a tiempo.

* * *

TO GOOD SHELTER

I

The other world.

Light opened its doors to me
when I wanted to follow the course
of that solemn,
dark dream
in a direction against the day.
A golden waterfall,
fine needles
pierced my blindness:
crystal dust,
word never seen,
aurora.
New balance.
New brilliance.
Gift of group weddings,
paradise in the apple of science,
true juice,
joy in season.

* * *

Element. Scale. Concept. The grand. The universe. The what-is-beyond-there. It’s an edition with both sides of the tongue, Spanish and the English translation. The sounds of the Spanish please me and here’s clear the catch between what means and how sounds. A book about gifts. Tables here are mostly laden. This is for you, says the book. Have you read Neruda’s Odes? Have you loved Mistral? Paz? Here is another voice speaking their idiom, where branches are loved so much there is no cold. Robert Lowell hides in a few lines. A young bird jumps through cables of light.

C.D. Wright (poet, essayist, leading the light-charge for my heart), ONE WITH OTHERS [a little book of her days], published 2010 by Copper Canyon Press.

from ONE WITH OTHERS

To sit in a booth and order a sweet soft drink

To work at the front deask

To be referred to as Gentleman

To swim in the pool

To sit in the front row and watch Run Wild, Run Free [next week: Death of a Gunfighter]

To make your way to the end of the day with both eyes in your head

Nothing is not integral

You want to illumine what you see

Fear reflected off an upturned face

Those walnuts turning black in the grass

It is a relatively stable world

Gentle Reader

But beyond that door

It defies description

* * *

A record of involvement, implication, resistance, community; the particular participation of an Arkansas town in the institution and embodiment of racism and racist lawmaking; the possibility of solidarity; the possibility of change, even understanding; the fact remaining of a great injustice.

The possibilities in poetry for the long form. Openness and ability to repeat oneself [Come again]. Repetition to create impression. This is what I mean by effect, as in to have one. Which it does. And the possibility in a longer work of dealing with difficult things slowly so as not to gloss them and not to be able to pretend they are simple. Which Wright does not.