Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Creole Hegemony

2015; Duke University Press; Volume: 19; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1215/07990537-3139430

0799-0537

Mario Alejandro Ariza,

Cuban History and Society

Piedra volcánica that pricks the skin,the basalts up north have nothing on you.So what if the sea at edge wears you smooth?At center you're rough—you jutinto the piel that doesn't take time with you.Only the jaivas have your scuttle downand they would flee when we hung lanternsat the cliff's edge every moonless night.A traer las sardinas, whole shoals of them.Wilson and my grandfather hushing mecuando la linterna revelaba formaswhere the water roared up into sea.Bring a board with which to sit upon the rock,take your time, and cast a line into the dark.Cut current, snap each neckto attention. Fans, lights,flickering, fondling, stop.It gets so damn hot stickyevery body starts leavingHiroshima shadows of sweat.The boredom physically hurtsafter fourth hour manuallyaerating the fishtank. Hey, look!Inside each tiny bubble a City,absolute abject alone (exceptfor the fish.) What must atomicpeople in bubble cities thinkof you, oh absent fatherin the cloying night? You leftjust like the light. For work, foranother country. You'd callonce a fortnight, and when the powerwent out I'd pick up the receiverand whisper into the phone: “Apagón,apagón, where have you gone?”At first few, but every summermore apartments. Unfinishedbuildings left leaning in rain.The Haitian men who builtwould dream in them at night,their cooking fires glow likeamber. Like sap, like sap I sawa man fall down. Scaffoldcollapse. Nine, or ten, I ranto tell my grandma. Shesaid, “Bueno, por lo menos,hay uno menos.” I comefrom here, this burl of earth.Abuelita, I love you, but youstill pray to Saint LyndonJohnson for delivering usfrom the comunistas in ’65.My prayer differs. Like sap,that man clings to the air solet palms became palms; fingers,fronds. Teeth gnash into lianasoozing out all agony. Maywrapped vines turn into armsupturned to grasp, and let grassgreen weave a chest that unweavesinto a mountain: La CordilleraOccidental breathingsilver mist over Puerto Plata.Miseria is a carnival without stoplights where a lonepoliceman in colonial khakiis casi atropellado by fuguesof motorbikes donde hay tengirls cantando entre snarlingcars y un one-armed mantrying to wash the windshieldof my mother's Mercedeswith just a smile hayChildren too young balan-cing blue tubs of peanutbrittle upon so soft skullsy the most extreme caseof goiter que jamás veráslimping past in hot tears.Every now, then infantshanging from Haitianwomen brightly clad,smile.Grandfather never grew one hyacinth.No rosebud ever sprang from his dull spade.Instead, he would pick up old coconutsand with black carbón, blow orchids into themlike flames. He knew their proper names, too.Phalaenopsis and dendrobiumeran regalos when occasion demandedand escape when all else demanded too much.Yet, for the birth of his children's childrenel viejo plantó árboles:for Gabriella, a Caribbean pineto Daniél a royal palm, and I got a roble,an ironwood oak that grows, and grows.