Art and poetry 2024

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Fotones.



Viendo, nos mantenemos viendo,
vemos nuestros recuerdos en el pasado,

vemos nuestros sueños hacia el futuro,

ves el reloj.

Vemos a nuestros hijos creciendo,

vemos seres queridos queriendo,

vemos fragmentos de sol.

Vemos nuestra taza de café y nuestras prioridades.

Vemos los menús en restaurantes y en las calles estudiantes,

vemos cuadros, vemos playas,

vemos amarse a amantes,

vemos murales, vemos al vecino, al amigo,

al beligerante.

Vemos también al canalla y vemos al cliente,

al terraplanista y al más consciente,

vemos la tierra trepidante y sin asombro

vemos caer al ignorante,

vemos césped y palomas, vemos caballos relinchantes.

Los fotones nos alumbran, es luz guía,

nos mantiene a salvo de la nada,

van muy discretos conectando a las miradas,

van ofreciendo tonos y matices,

susurran melancolía cuando los días son grises.

Van revelando misterios que antaño apesadumbraban,

nos dicen cómo y por dónde,

nos señalan las entradas.

Le echan la luz al de enfrente para ver si es compatible,

nos sugieren conversar si su cara no es horrible.

Nos quitan el pudor cuando la luz nos embriaga.

Me han enseñado a contemplar, también a ser contemplada.

Ayudan contando historias, luciérnagas consagradas.

Cuando es la luz es tanta que parece deslumbrar,

se usa el nombre de "estrella", aludiendo al destellar.

Afuera la estrella quema, combustiona y se consume,

aquí también lo hace cuando ya no hay quién la fume.

Se deja ver por otros emitiendo propia luz,

ya luego pereciendo, se le dice enana azul.

Lejos en el espacio la luz al cosmos nos muestra,

nos cuenta de los planetas, vemos estrellas funestas,

luego están las nebulosas inmensas y de colores,

con formas particulares y muchos más pormenores.

Fotografiamos Marte, ya sabemos más de él,

si seguimos persistiendo iremos de cien en cien.

Prendele una veladora a tu santo más querido,

ruégale a tus deidades que iluminen tu camino.

Que te llenen de fotones, partícula portadora,

que te brinden rayos gamma, que hagas una supernova.

Y ya cuando te diviertas y hayas implosionado,

cuando juegues con neutrinos, cuando mucho hayas viajado,

ayúdame a hacer visible lo que está en la oscuridad,

dejemos entrar la luz, como la aurora boreal.

Que reboten los fotones muy curiosos en su avance.

Que hagan la danza lacustre y nos salven de un percance.

Que vayan tiñendo la noche áspera y amarga,

que se lleven de un chasquido la tristeza que te embarga.

Que iluminen fuera y dentro, por detrás y cenital,

que difuminan o enfoquen, según el show que nos dan.

Con destellos de uno en uno, alegres y rutilantes,

de tintineo jubiloso, laxo y centelleante.

Photons


Seeing, we keep on seeing,
we see our memories in the past,

we see our dreams towards the future,

you look at the clock.

We see our children growing,

we see loved ones loving,

we see fragments of the sun.

We see our cup of coffee and our priorities.

We see the menus in restaurants and on the streets, students,

we see paintings, we see beaches,
we see lovers loving,

we see murals, we see the neighbor, the friend,

the belligerent one.

We also see the scoundrel, and we see the client,

the flat-earther and the most conscious,

we see the trembling earth and without astonishment,

we see the ignorant fall,

we see grass and pigeons, we see neighing horses.

Photons light us up, they are guiding lights,

they keep us safe from nothingness,

they go very discreetly, connecting gazes,

offering tones and shades,

whispering melancholy when the days are gray.

They unveil mysteries that once weighed us down,

they tell us how and where,

they point out the entrances.

They cast light on the one in front to see if they are compatible,

they suggest conversation if their face is not horrible.

They strip away shame when the light intoxicates us.

They’ve taught me to contemplate, and also to be contemplated.

They help by telling stories, consecrated fireflies.

When the light is so much that it seems to dazzle,

it’s called “star”, referring to its gleam.

Outside, the star burns, combusts, and consumes,

here too, it does so when no one smokes it anymore.

It lets itself be seen by others, emitting its own light,

and later, perishing, it is called a blue dwarf.

Far away in space, light shows us the cosmos,

it tells us about planets, we see fateful stars,

then come the immense, colorful nebulas,

with particular shapes and many more details.

We photograph Mars, we already know more about it,

if we keep persisting, we'll go from one hundred to one hundred more.

Light a candle for your most beloved saint,

pray to your deities to illuminate your path.

May they fill you with photons, the carrier particle,

may they gift you gamma rays, may you become a supernova.

And when you finally have fun and have imploded,

when you play with neutrinos, when you’ve traveled far,

help me make visible what is in the dark,

let's let the light in, like the aurora borealis.

Let the photons bounce, curious in their advance.

Let them dance the lakeshore dance and save us from mishap.

Let them tint the night, rough and bitter,

let them take with a snap the sadness that burdens you.

Let them light inside and out, from behind and overhead,

let them blur or focus, depending on the show they give us.

With flashes one by one, joyful and sparkling,

with jubilant tinkling, relaxed and twinkling.

— Sara Batalla

Sara Batalla nació en la ciudad de México en 1989, y sus primeras historias surgieron del insomnio que padecía. Después de estar cerca de la muerte y posteriormente ganar un concurso de novela, decide que quería dedicarse a escribir y vivir de ello. 

Sara Batalla was born in Mexico City in 1989, and her first stories arose from the insomnia she suffered. After coming close to death and subsequently winning a novel contest, she decided that she wanted to dedicate herself to writing and make a living from it.

A Small Eternity

Alone, soaring, my balcony a cloud
in the sky’s gentle hold,
I look out on a beach, a paradise
where the green (whispering, roaring)
has said all it has to say.
A green that almost glows with pistachio-colored edges.
A green that suckles, crawls,
grows into bright apricot
and enters an ornate rust
like an overripe pomegranate skin.
A greyish green escaping a blend of blue,
a pearly green that leans into copper,
a translucent grape-green that leans into
I don’t know what.
The forests rest in slopes that touch
the lake’s silence from all sides,
and the scents of flowers ascend
from the mountain’s foot toward me,
high as earth-bound birds.

The mountains look ancestral,
like our grandfathers who typically know their places,   
the mountains are epochs,
and if you look closely, they’re the body of time itself.
Adorned with boats, the lake’s water resembles
a granddaughter’s dress. Half-asleep she listens
to the mountains tell their magical stories
as the shy breeze floats
(through the villages around the water’s arc)
almost apologetic for the rustle of leaves.

And I, with two wings that happened suddenly,
soar overlooking this vastness,
and having become a bird perhaps,
I get to realize what a bird’s view is, for now.
I said this is a morning of tenderness
for those who observe it,
of scenes that grow tender for one another.
I would need a year
to learn the names of these trees,
plants, blooms, and birds,
a year to learn my name here.
Here, poetry is perfected,
so write as you desire, stranger,
the alphabet desires you here.

I contemplated my body, and it confused me:
under the buttons of this light shirt
there’s a present
like a knee that’s hit the marble,
and there’s a fearsome past 
like a wolf that thinks of a child
and insists that I call it a future. 
There are my people’s houses
that have swapped people,
and losses are arranged
like dictionaries on the shelves.

I shut my body, but my eyes stay open
like my mother’s window
which never watched her grandchildren
play in the garden—
though she did witness Yahweh’s Army play
with our days, and she lived the reversal of attributes,
the victim’s corruption from head to toe,
and the collapse of yearnings and roofs.

Under the buttons of this light shirt,
I continue the work of the living:  
I keep Radwa warm,
Majid stays late at my house,
and Umm Munif picks flowers from her garden
as she waits for Munif.  
Here we are walking together in the mountains’ morning,
we talk and listen, tire, slow down, rest, rush,
rage and forgive,
we forget, get lost a little, ask for directions,
recite one of Al-Mutanabbi’s lines,
and laugh at a joke that merges with our tears.

Can I change death’s mind and convince it of its failure?
Can death believe I’m walking with my departed’s feet?
Because my steps are their steps,
and my eyes are their eyes,
and this poem is their listening.
Do I convince death that they’re happening to me now
like salvation or an embrace?
They’re happening to me now
so that together we may bear
the burden of this unbearable beauty,
a small eternity surprises us
in this instant indeed: Tamim is about to take a photo
. . . and I say, Hold on a second:

I will fix Radwa’s collar,
draw Munif and my mother closer to me,
and move the tallest, my father and Majid, to the center.
Can death be persuaded that we’ve been resurrected whole,
slipped from its hands, and flown with the birds?
Above the lake, we became lake,
became mountains and shadows,
and sidewalk cafés.

Here I am banishing longing from my language.
Longing, the confession that breaks
place in two, the body in two, the self in two.
The riverbank is the river.
Without it, we don’t call it a river.
The mountains become mountains only with their valleys.
And the flowers, don’t they need stems to bloom?
Doesn’t a hilt need a sword to live?
Who can separate the bird from the possibilities of wings,
and the waves from the sea?
Who now can separate ship from water?
Who says spring is the absence of summer?
Who separates clouds from shades of white?
There’s no halo in the sky
without a moon at its heart.

Did I just say this
or did my departed improvise it?
I’m not sure,
but I don’t miss them—
they’re here
under the buttons of my light shirt.

— Mourid Barghouti
Poems from Palestine

Translated by Zeina Hashem Beck
 
Read more at:
thebaffler.com/logical-revolts/poems-from-palestine

My Windy City

Prejudged like an unwanted birth, for the impoverished are cast away and condemned to be nothing but lower class citizens.

We’re products of an environment that was created for their profits and agendas.

Their experimental projects are now our community’s prisons, like cages on display for the world to see.

With food stamps and handouts, why work, when you can get that shit for free?

We were poor, hungry, and desperate from always having empty pockets and crying mouths to feed.

So we hustled off amethyst rocks, selling them on our neighborhood’s blocks, poisoning the very people living within them.

Turning homes into warzones, with gunshots singing lullabies to the forgotten youth every night.

Their coffins are laced with the fabric of our greed, for that almighty dollar is the only god we ever believed.

So now it’s money over bitches, and snitches get stitches, for only true savages can walk these broken streets.

Like primal animals we stalk and prey, on the lonely, on the lost, and on the weak.

We truly are our own worst enemies, the very fall of mankind.Abandoning our families, and making bastards of our seeds.

We are sentenced within these walls, out of humanity’s sight and its existence.

We claim society is to blame, making us want all the money and the fame.

Yet we are the ones who destroy each other for gold watches and chains.

Such sad, simple minded, little fucking creatures!

We should remember Karma is a bitch, she will leave you dead in a ditch, and that nothing in this world ever comes for free!

— S.E. Canella
Washington State Penitentiary

Girl with a Mustache

Probably shouldn't
be wearing
skinny jeans
with these
hips.

Joan Jett
concert t-shirt,
indignant at
those who
mock me
for being
kitsch.

"You look
like a girl
with a mustache!"
once said
pointedly,
desperate to
deny it
I fail,
again.

Fiends will
never know
the full
sorrow of
being transgender
in America.

— Madison Jones

Madison April Jones is a transgender writer from West Richland, Washington who has published several articles on LGBT topics in Seattle Gay News, among others. For business inquiries or previous articles, please make contact through her website: https://madisonapril.carrd.co

Dancing Spirits in Harmony

He serenades with his soulful voice🎙and instrument 🪗
awakening those from the underground 🪦
they will soon join in as part of his symphony 🎵

'Snap, crackle, pop' as each spirit awakens from the underground
adding to the beat 🎶 like a harmonious melody,
with some making sounds that mimic whispers of a drum🥁

Stretches and leaps, hips shaking and breaking🦴
from right to left, bodies hopping up like springs
which sound like chimes playing in the background of your favorite song

The sounds of feet crackle with each step
as they add to the beat.
It's a fun but freaky sight.

In the background, in the darkness of the night,
critters 🦗 join in to add their very own vibrato —
Hoots, howls 🦉, and hisses 🐉, taps🪳, whistles 🐦‍⬛, and squishes 🐈‍⬛🕸🕷

It's a special occasion!
The spirits have awoken
to the 🎶 soulful, musical sound✨️

It's a magical night 🪄🌚
and with each twist and turn
they all join in on the celebration.

Dancing and shaking, twerking and jerking,
to the sounds of the beat ♡
In sync and in perfect harmony.

— Alicia Barrera

I’m so tired

Of giving
Giving
Giving,
And in return …

Gifts
You took
Without thanks,

Explanations
You denied
Without consideration,

Blame
You justified
Without remorse,

Yet still
I want to keep giving,
When the memories creep in
And wounds are scabbed,
I forget the callous return
For my affection.

— Kira