from Sopa de ajo y mezcal
09.10.15
translated from the Spanish by Alexis Almeida
Trabaja sobre sus zapatos de cuero. un tacón y otro. una correa y otra. una hebrilla y otra. traspasa los muchos todos escalones ascendentes hasta el sitio. oaxaca abre su noche en el recuerdo de su noche anterior. anterior risa anterior máscara anterior lenguaje. como una sombra sup echo, su espacio pegado a ese círculo de flores. tiene lo amarillo entre sus manos, lo rojo en sus hombros, el borde quebrado de la oscuridad que consuma hasta tela; hebra delgada en el tiempo flojo o hueco de la dicha. la sustancia que se le antoja a la nada para convertirse en pájaro. su pluma acuesta lo que escribe en lo anterior que pone. vuelve a su casa y rompe el gesto del gesto en el estado de detenido. no suma ningún otro destello boca abajo, boca abajo; porque todavía siente el aliento que trabaja en el vaivén quebrado de sus tacones que suben hasta el sitio desde donde se ve.
*
She works on her leather shoes. one heel and another. one strap and another. one buckle and another. she passes over every step leading up to this place. oaxaca reveals its night in the memory of the previous night. previous laughter previous disguise previous tongue. like a shadow her chest, its figure stuck to a circle of flowers. she has yellow between her hands, red in her shoulders, the broken edge of a darkness that consumes even cloth, thin thread in the weak empty time of joy. the substance that nothingness wants to turn into a bird. her pen lays down what it writes in what it wrote before. she returns to her house and removes a face from a frozen face. no more sparking face down, face down; she still feels the breath that works through the broken swing of her heels that ascend toward the place where she can see.
Vuelve sobre el borde; la imagen recurrente de sus zapatos que asfixia. la calle imagina otro tiempo para su oscuridad. sus dos pies se balancean en la inclinación. tiene el recuredo de su adentro como una presencia que vive. describe círculos y semicírculos en el devenir de la escalera vacía. un escalón y otro y otro y la calle. el invento seguido del invento. hay, en el centro de su cuerpo, un sismo, un traspaso, una puerta invisible que devora lo que hubo para llegar a lo que falta. abraza como un otro; flores, en el amarillo, el verde, el rojo; el negro. su vestido.
*
She returns to the edge; the recurring image of her shoes that asphyxiates. the street imagines another time for its darkness. her two feet balancing on an incline. she has a memory of her insides like a living presence. she describes circles and semicircles in the progression of an empty staircase. one stair and another and another and the street. invention after invention. there is, in the center of her body, an earthquake, a transference, an invisible door that devours everything before it to get to what’s missing. she touches like the other; flowers, in yellow, green, red; black. her dress.
El espejo anterior a su rostro. desnuda el recuerdo anterior de lo que tuvo. tiene la presencia en sus manos cargadas de flores. aquello inventa mil formas de lo que espera. en el ruedo, aquello sobrando como identidad y palabra. donde dice aquello debe decir tibo animal nuevo que es capaz de arrancar el dolor gota a gota de su corazón entumorado. donde dice aquello debe decir tibio animal nuevo que la besa hasta arrancar ese cuerpo lentamente. donde dice debe, debe haber un blanco grande; la presencia de lo que no existe. donde dice aquello debe decir: cuerpo de sí misma que renace en el centro de su nombre y la libera. donde dice, debe decir lo que no se consuma. donde dice eso debe decir no eso. donde dice “bésame mucho,” debe decir siempre te amé. donde dice escribe debe decir su escribir le pertenece.
*
The mirror previous to her face. she undresses the previous memory to the one she had. she holds a presence in her hands filled with flowers. invents a thousand forms for what’s waiting. in the bullring, excessive things like identity and words. where she says it better say warm new animal capable of ripping the pain bit by bit from your calloused heart. where she says it better say warm new animal that kisses her until ripping her apart. where she says it should, should be a big whiteness; the presence of what doesn’t exist. where she says it better say: her own body reborn in the center of her name that frees her. where she says, it better say what doesn’t consume. where she says it better say something else not that. where “kiss me again,” better say I always loved you. where she says she writes better say her writing belongs to her.
——————
Florencia Walfisch was born in Buenos Aires. She writes and makes textile art. She has participated in various individual and group shows, interdisciplinary projects, and poetry readings. With Ana Lafferranderie, she curates the reading series at Fedro, a bookstore and cultural center in San Telmo. Her poetry has appeared in various journals and anthologies. In 2004, Sopa de Ajo y Mezcal received the Jaime Sabines prize from Coneculta in Chiapas. She lives and works in her hometown.
Alexis Almeida received her MFA from the University of Colorado. Her recent poems, essays, and translations have appeared or are forthcoming in TYPO, Vinyl Poetry, Denver Quarterly, Heavy Feather Review, Oversound, and elsewhere. She is an assistant editor at Asymptote and a contributing poetics editor at The Volta. A finalist for the Fine Arts Work Center fellowship, she was recently awarded a Fulbright grant to Argentina. Her translation of Florencia Castellano’s Monitored Properties is forthcoming from Ugly Duckling Presse. She lives in Denver.
Fanzine’s Fall poetry editor is Julia Cohen. Her most recent book is a hybrid collection of lyric essays, I Was Not Born (Noemi Press, 2014). Her other books are Collateral Light (Brooklyn Arts Press, 2014) and Triggermoon Triggermoon (Black Lawrence Press, 2011). Her work appears in journals like DIAGRAM, Colorado Review, Entropy, The Destroyer, and Kenyon Review Online. She’s currently translating with Jens Bjering the Danish poet Theis Ørntoft. She lives in Chicago and is looking for snow pants.
