traducciones se vienen !

idealista ii
mary ritchie

BABYTHEREISNOPLACEINTHISWORLD
FORYOUANDME

IWISHI’DKNOWNSOONER
TOMOVEOUTOFASPACE
FULLOFCOMPROMISEDFURNITURE
ANDLOWLIGHT

THEREAREROOMSINMYHEART
THATAREBOTHVACANTANDOCCUPIED
FORTHEDAYSYOUNEEDLOVE
ANDTHEDAYSTHERE’SSOMETHING
BETTER

WHENWILLIFINDSOMETHINGBETTER?

WHYAREYOUSTILLTHEBESTTOLOVE?

INABATHROOMLASTNIGHT,
ISAIDIMISSYOUOUTLOUD
IWROTEITONTHEWALLS

BUTTOBEHONEST
I’VEDRAGGEDTHISPAINOUT
FORTOOLONGNOW

THEREISNOROOMFORLOVE
THEREISNOLOVE

MYMAMA’SVOICECREEPSFROMAROOM
WHERENOSOUNDISSUPPOSEDTOPENETRATE
IWASINTHEBATHROOMBEHINDTHEWALL
ANDIHEARDEVERYTHING

SHEWHISPERSTOME
LOVEISWHATKEEPSUSALIVE

MYMOTHERISDYING

IMSOTIREDOFALLOFTHIS

GLASS
mary ritchie

When I look at my reflection,
I sometimes don’t see myself,
but the body my brain has harnessed
and now controls.
It assigned my identity to the body
rather than itself
so I won’t get overwhelmed,
but as I step in front of the mirror,
that creeping terror
pools at my feet.
And I whisper:
“Hello, brain.”

Memories are impressions
onto clean, smooth surfaces in our brains—
parts yet to be written on.
The memories we like, we revisit
to relive the pleasure of the initial—
certain faces, places, sensations
signify and trigger the memory’s experience.
We do it with bad memories too.

In any case, this habit acts
in consideration of the future—
how to survive without pain
and to even live in bliss.

We trace our fingers over memories,
keep touching their shape,
scratching bits of brain away
until it’s a valley
then a canyon

until it’s a hole in your brain
that you set on fire
like the soviets in Turkmenistan
when they discovered a methane reserve in 1971.
And it’s still burning—
the tissue crumbling
as that fire seeps deeper.

How do I climb out of this hole I’ve dug in my brain?

Think about something

else—
A clean surface,
Pure and reflecting,
where my face is new again—

A pool of still water
in a sink
outside a coffee shop
on a street
I have walked up and down so many times,
its association belongs to
no one and no thing
because it holds so many memories
at once,
no particular one
can peel itself away from the others—
so they form a new surface amongst themselves.

A pool of still water
in the sink
behind Highland Coffees
on East Chimes Street.
It’s still there
while I’m here,
in the teacher’s lounge
in a small town
in Spain,
trying to put out this fire
in my brain.

Hello, holy burning brain.
You won’t be on fire much longer.

A clean surface,
pure and reflecting
any object in front of it,
where my face is new again.

On Chimes Street,
my hand travels through several layers of glass—
through old windows outside
and tiny windows on the door
to a mirror
resting against the wall of a living room.
This is not happening,
it is a memory
that makes me think
of another memory.

Or rather,
a collection of them
that blur into one—
where I sit
in front of a window
and reflect the face
of the brain looking at me.

Me,
a clean surface,
pure and reflecting,
an object
of something less than desire
to hold in his pocket
and observe as he pleases,
where his face is new again.

I have been a mirror for years,
absorbing those glances
from eyes seeking solace
and peace,
forgetting my own
woeful glances swirling
in those eyes strapped to my brain,
wondering where sadness comes from.
Years sitting there—
a mirror in a window,
a sink behind the coffee shop
on a street that is so familiar
I forgot what I was doing there.

People ask me what I’m doing here.
I tell them I write.
I accumulate and inscribe memories
traced in brains
with the hopes that the holes
will stop burning
and eventually re-level.

I don’t say all that though.
And I never say “for my baby.”
Only fools fall into something as deep as love.
But a fool is just a clean slate
with a smooth brain.
What I am is not good and sweet
like a fool.
It’s a relentless spiral
I can’t seem to find
the start of.
That I allow to keep sinking into.

But now is not the time
to dig myself deeper.
Nine swords above my bed,
ten in my back,
I must reach the promised land—
milk and honey, rivers and valleys.

I look at a picture of my brother’s brain.
I look at a picture of my brother.
Hello, brother.

The white mass in the center of him
is beginning to shrink.
Burning pits can be quenched and leveled again.
My brother laughs at a joke I make over the phone.
We have to laugh.
To be calm.
Simple.
External.
To walk past a window and only notice briefly.
To stand in front of a mirror and only see your face.

palabras