Reina Maria Rodriguez (Cuba)
translated by Kristin Dykstra

The bathtub and the heating pipe
where you can entwine your neck
in a shoelace
if the body hangs one span
higher than its ideal for resurrection.
“Go back, go back in time”
— what the father wants —
to vindicate him.

I put the vase out
and take it back quickly,
because they died young
and flowers aren’t enough
to calm the anxiety.
It wasn’t a struggle
to put your head in the oven, Sylvia;
into the loop, Juan;
under a wheel–shaped paperweight,
my brother.
It wasn’t a struggle, Rom n
to hang from the wire
like a bird disemboweled
in the wind from the heater.
“The sensitive ones,” they say:
return, begin.
I remember Georgette
ascending the coast on her bicycle,
Maeterlinck riding behind.
The one thing I do is think about that moment
when I couldn’t hold you up
or save you from the axe.

from Poemas de Navidad [Christmas Poems], Bokeh, 2018

by Reina Maria Rodriguez (Cuba)
translated by Kristin Dykstra

Everything I took was only borrowed:
your house
quilt
pillow
pocket mirror
waistline
teeth
head.
Everything in place for an everything
that vanished
and was surrendered
differently
when I cried or when you smiled.
Now,
the corners discredit
something present only in appearance
and the walls fell
paint peeling
over pictures
fruits
bottles
plates
bottle opener.

from the unpublished manuscript “Mazorcas” [Corncobs]

by Reina Maria Rodriguez (Cuba)
translated by Kristin Dykstra

The mahogany desk was swelling with termites
(like the piano),
the bones turning
brittle as they sank:
“The writer’s existence really depends
on a desk,” said Kafka.
I lost my desk many years ago.

The existence of music depends
on an instrument too:
“. . . We’ve got no music, we’ve got rain,”
he kept on shouting.
We’ve got no love letters
in that rounded “o” of
incorruptible desire,
its finishes assonated
by the woman who used to walk,
who used to play the piano,
who used to
trust.

from El piano, 2017