Maybe it was unwise to leave ...
... I told a friend my dad kept insisting I come home at least for a year. She said “that’s a big sacrifice”

Maybe it was unwise to be born a girl...
... in my society they think  you belong to your family. Even my mom came “to get me”
She loves me/ she’s getting older/ This time I should listen to her –those are the thought that won.

Maybe all these decisions were not wise... and it’s not a maybe my plans let you down...
... my plans let me down, too. I was sure I could make it. It seemed as certain as waking up the next day.

But it was not my decision not to get on that plane. It simply wouldn’t go. The whole world has halted and the boats won’t go and the planes won’t take off  –they are suspended.

Maybe no wand I could wave could fix
a world crisis
and maybe not even the disappointed
& strain this has brought,
but maybe compassion and understanding could begin to heal not just you or me but everyone whose boats were docked, flights canceled and schedules ruined.

Maybe I can step away from my personal tragedies to see the larger framed photograph that hangs on our global galleria...
...there are some people out there tonight in hospital rooms crying for loved ones who have left and other fighting an illness because they long for life –for the breath we’ve still got. ( as long as I breathe I told my self I try to back it back)

Maybe it is wise for me to stop crying now. There are things that are out of my control and my reaction is a child needing love whom I can rear.

Her hand moves in a back and forth manner
as if she were playing the trombone
But she's really just pulling my greñas
spreading more Brillantina
to make her baby's hair sparkle    
even though its color is nowhere near that of brass

The people go out and line up
Lining up is an everyday thing, right ?
25 or less people at a time
these crowds aren’t so popular

life dissolves
and yesterday's heat persists
in the right seasons
and imagining your face in front of mine
I,too want to dissolve
      
               d
                    i
                       s
                  s
              o
             l
                v
                  e

between this spring
hoping that my cocktail of atoms
arrives as a postcard to your address

on nights like these the pact that the soul
made with the body wants to undo
because I would like to be free
to go embrace you

and ask you  << what weighs on you? >>
and << can i help you carry it? >>

and finally
tell you sincerely that
<< I won't give up >>
for you, in times like these, I come undone

la vida se disuelve
y la calor de ayer persiste
en las temporadas adequadas
y al imaginar tu cara frente a la mia
yo tambien
me quiero disolver
      
          d
                i
                    s
            ­    o
            l
          v
             e
              r

entre esta primavera
con la esperanza que mi coctel de átomos
llegase como postal a tu dirreccion  

en noches como estas el pacto que hizo el alma
con el cuerpo se quiere deshacer
pues me gustaria ser libre
para ir a sostenerte

y preguntarte <<¿Que te pesa?>>  
<<¿Te puedo ayudar a cargarlo?>> 
 y finalmente decirte
con sinceridad que <<por ti no me rindo>>
por ti, en tiempos como estos, me deshago

Little bits of awe wake me up
and undo all knots

They so elegantly swing me and  sway me into the following day with a sense of patient purpose

Small moments of life that make the heaviness exit and again,
make me light and able
to ascertain that dancing is for the spirits and the living who are
as willing as the leaves to rustle in the wind

I mother my sadness
and I mother my fear
I hold them in my arms
and sing to them songs of hope,
Compose for them
vocal melodies to blanket
their hurt  
Stuff a pillow full of the resilience
to to get us through the night
and safeguard us through these times

love, like a balm
love, like a winged being
love, like every branch swaying in the wind
love, like a force that keeps the celestial bodies in place

love, as an ointment
love, as transportation
love, as growth
love, as physics

Love is the only way I can describe how I feel...
...each path leading back to love; love –love

It seems this week has taken to its own will
chased me down the hill into the prairie as it came close
to lunchtime
–the starving lads crying–
the whetstone ready
its hands skinning my lips,
for once I am glad
there are no feathers
anywhere close to my mouth
–at least I can keep my wings

I have been too nice with poetry
–humoring extended metaphors–
throwing up my hands in praise
at how little can be written/ at how complexity can be simple / at how the abstract treads like a beast through a tunnel
onto this realm
arriving as the heavy letter on a screen or a page

I look at the decorative paper with colored illustrations of moths. They’re beautiful–why don’t people write more odes to moths? A moth is free.
The moth just like the butterfly comes to know flight, but when it’s sedentary it rests with its wings open unlike the butterfly. Why don’t we champion how it waits within this state of openness.
How when the moment comes it’ll be closer to readiness.

I look back at the many drawings on that same thin sheet over my desk and I want to cry. I guess I’m staying here a little longer; I will sit and rest like a moth–
preparing until I, too can take to the skies.

The kettle steaming cries just before you can pour a cup of tea/the dark hues on a wall must be painted twice if you want to replace them with something even a tad  bit lighter/a rocket must go 11 kilometers a second to then escape the pull of gravity/

Life sends me reminders of you
inserts you into conversations and
carries your presence into my days

I go about my week
one task at a time
watering the plants and sketching the leaves
–your presence burrows to the surface so I sit welcoming it

gathering roots from the soil and
clipping the longing
that grows when I leave myself unattended
and drift away from my innermost–home–
place of abidance
its "where" I can make out your silhouette
that runs alongside the wind
tucking its whispers inside its air currents

What is a beautiful heart: a heart that does not accept to shrink.

Baby of the earth with your tea and your notebook at hand you have as vast a kingdom as you did outside.

The walls here can simply be erased with the flipping of a pencil. The reality you wish to  experience, momentarily halts through no fault of your own. So sweet thing, inside your cove find freedom and draw, sing, walk, gaze, get lost in hobbies or the cinematic tales of heroes or heroines- rediscover folklore or learn through physics the reason why the celestial bodies, including your planet,move the way they do.

Do all the thing you keep telling yourself      
you do not have time for
because time has arrived and knocked at your door. Time has sought your address  –and you would be a fool not to take it’s hand and lead it into your living room.

Your sentiments are as sweet as confections
that I lick my fingers just to make sure not a single crumb of it
goes unattended by these languid taste buds
which my mouth has engendered to be critics of flavor.
Each word proves sugary
and each phrase seems to be dripped in agave syrup
making you a confectionist by heart.

The air is still fresh and the cooing of the birds is slowly becoming more audible.
The gleaming of the fluorescent lights is just as bright as the one outside. It’s doesn't matter whether you are inside or you are outside –near you there is always light.

I have spun up a mountain of silk ideas to cushion "my shelter in place" habitat from making papaya bread to challenging my malinois to sit still –I am well aware one of these will prove to be impossible– she has got more energy than me.  

I turn on the oven and decide to leave out the eggs and oil from the recipe–respice finem baby. I crank up my headset and delve into post-90's Columbian pop.

Risky domicile nonsense and dreams of well-behaved dogs make up the soft web I inwardly sit on while Juanes plays and I wait for the oven to preheat to 350 degrees.

Your smile warms me.
But I simply tell you I like it
“it looks good on you”

I write you sonnets and free form verse
where in my mind’s eye you are present
and well within reach
until I can come and sit by your side the photographs
and the 15 mb are the closests I get

I want to turn my head and catch  you grinning
at the daily happenings of life
I want to figure out what things slowly weave joy onto your arms
so that I can appreciate them, too

I have come to sympathize with the at home workout enthusiast and the tv show aficionado

my sweater of preference is a black zip up hoody whose two front pockets carry my hands when I get too tired of hanging them at my sides
                              ...
I lounge like a lizard. When sun is at its peak, I walk into the yard and lay on the warm cement walkway that leads to the backyard. Toasty. An Argentinian tegu in another lifetime.
                             ...
I’m the only lizard who regulates it body temperature. Toasty when I want to be.
                             ...
I rappelled back down to the group. I was unfastening my harness when my instructor turned to me and said “ you must have  been a lizard in your past life.”

perhaps the body needed rest
and much of the streets needed silence

as the churning of the great metropolis would not halt
if this was not the case

as we see living as the art of productivity in lieu of the art of leisure

factory smoke subsiding and even the sky is in languor

the verandas come to us and the sweetest smell cannot be dispelled from the california orchards blooming,
each season has them blinking food
into existence
and the momentary insects, birds and grown children pick the ripened seeds to nurture their bodies during one rotation of the earth around Huitzilopochtli

May the day soothe you and bring you all the strength you need
pour into your being how ever many cups of sweetness are needed to balance out the sour taste

May the day remind you, you are capable of whatever dream, you wish to reach for
that your years have grown your roots, so there is no need to worry; even from afar I can see you’re a tree that can weather storms.

Can words kiss?
How solid can they become?

Are they able to get real close and
ask to peck your right cheek
while slowly making their way to your upper lip?

Can their temperature carry over –far above the pacific ocean– to the place you're in?

there were dandelions on the grass
dear girl, the smell of an Alcatraz flower is fresh on my linen
but sometimes I look back
and wonder if this city wears a too thick a coat
while it struts pantless over the sidewalks of
Macarther Park

there is liturgy mumbled, a woman waving her hands in the air–
Sunday school prayers being learned in Spanish
tri-folded pamphlets on the floor
and gum over the pavement blackened by the cooperative march
of immigrant workers speaking in all tongues and carrying
on their backs, the tower of babel while halted at a red light

heavy cargo trucks speeding down Alameda Street
wearing down the road and the patience of drivers
tents multiplied, and R.V's lining the streets  
the old buildings being torn down and neighboring apartments  getting face-lifts  
"beautification"
costs
more than headshots–
more than a rhinoplasty–
more than the real estate of DTLA–
when you see two kids come out of a tent with their school backpacks on
–you begin to grasp the price

Is this what Keats meant: "A thing of beauty is a joy forever "
even while destitute
the neon pink on their bags seemed like another gift of spring
and their perseverance the paragon of  a psalm of life

you come with the little whispers of the day
with the silence that finds me unconsciously speaking your name
even whist dreaming–
I find you–
I feel you when I am awake...
...at odd hours of the night;
a warmth between my ribs that begins to pulsate

I like that the people are sweet gum hugging you. You are everyone’s “daughter”
“My daughter” this is how my mother introduces me.

I adore looking at the elderly holding  each other as they start playing the ballads
they’re bodies like mazapán
fragile but the looks they give each other
suffice to sugar the landscape

I like to see the children run through the dance floor
on their faces joy is enlarged

The music is loud and constant
–and it becomes our bread of life

Me gusta que la gente es como chicle dulce que te abraza. De todos eres  “mija”
<<mi hija>> así me presenta mi madre

Adoro ver a los viejitos agarrados
cuando empiezan las baladas
sus cuerpos son como mazapán
frágiles pero las miradas que se dan
son suficientes para azúcar el paisaje

Me gusta ver a los niños corren por la pista de baile sobre sus caras se agranda la alegría.

La music es alta y constante
y se convierte en pan de vida

placed inside the mortar are my grandmother’s carnations
and petals from the roses in my mother’s garden
to them I add California poppy oil and I spread them over me as a remedy

en el molcajete están los claveles de mi abuela y los pétalos de las rosas del jardín de mi madre
a ellos les agregó aceite de amapola de California y me la unto como remedio

I just want to be in the vicinity of you.

Lounge like a lizard around you taking in the sun.

1.
Fizz and sparkles...
...undulated hair and a long salmon scarf
I stand over a running sink searching for you.

If there were fish swimming around my neck, defying gravity could I then reach for you?

Like i have reached countless times before,
sometimes i have gotten close enough
to have seen the clearness of your eyes meet me in defiance...
...what do I say to a child born into this world that smells of ocean?

2.
I met you years ago, when your  hands were small. And there was a sea rotating over your head. The whales seemed to soar above us –and you’d extend your left hand and guide me in.

3.
Your world... so gentle. You could not bare to leave it. When people see water circle around your fingers, you do not care to explain to them such a phenomenon

that is why love you
that is why I do not drink the soup of this     world

  that is why I keep sieving their words
  and this faucet water through my hands

  4. I lose you sometimes, but I always come back. It’s odd to live in a place such as this without your company.

the salt chuck above your head and the inlets that hang close to your ears guide me back in to the reefs and among the floating fishes.

5.
Fizz and sparkles...
...undulated hair and a long salmon scarf
I stand over a running sink and I see the reflection of  you
smiling back at me.

Your eyes
your skin
your body

hold inside them
someone I love

they are
precious
miraculous
instruments
of life

they allow me to find you
in flesh
they allow me to sit at the hearth
in front of your fire
they allow me to share with you
my ember

your brown
pupils
your soft
hands

the days
pass
and i thank every sunset

knowing
“soon”,
will become
“now”

Lhasa likes basketball, although she is tall, she is awful with the ball.

She perceives the arc to be far away and the more nervous she gets the farther that orange arc moves away.

However, everyday she likes to get to her school gym early to shoot some hoops.

The more hoops she shoots, the closer she gets –the distance dissolving in front of her.

A Lhasa de gusta el baloncesto más ,aunque es alta, ella es pésima con el balón.

El arco se le hacia lejos y lo más nerviosa que se pone lo más que se le aleja ese arco anaranjado.

Más cada día a ella le gusta llegar temprano al gimnasio de su escuela
para disparar unos aros.

Los más aros que dispara, los mas que se acera–la distancia se desase frente a ella.

She crosses bridges  (they are not to be venerated)

"She forgot God," the old man murmured, when she did not want to enter the parish.

It had been many years now, that the “what will they say" had become a spider web–ancient and swaying in the wind.

She knew that bridges are necessary.

“You have to cross bridges
but you shouldn’t venerate them ”

Her mother taught her that only God is to be venerated, but perhaps venerating  was not the point, “you have to cross;  you have to be in communion” she thought

Inside her chest she had found a corner where her soul would dissolve, and mix with the infinite energy of "everything"
and no religion would deny her that

And although the old  man knew about bridges he didn't know how to cross them.

The afternoon was slowly becoming evening, and Fatima decided she’d best stroll back home and enjoy to the fullest whatever daylight was left.

Ella cruzas puentes (ellos no son de venerar)

“Se olvidó de Dios ” murmuró el señor, cuando ella no quiso entrar a la parroquia.

Más ya hacia años que “el que dirán” se le había convertido en una telaraña, antigua y meciéndose entre el viento.

Ella sabía que los puentes son necesarios.

“Hay que cruzar por los puentes
pero no hay que venerarlos”

Su madre le enseñó que solo a dios se le venera, pero tal vez venerar tan poco fuese el punto, “hay que cruzar; hay que estar en comunión” pensaba

Dentro de su pecho ella había encontrado un rincón donde su alma se desasía, y se mezclaba con la infinita energía de lo “todo”
y ninguna religión le negaría eso

Y aunque el hombre supiera de puentes no sabía de cruzar

La tarde se estaba convirtiendo lentamente en noche, y Fátima decidió que sería mejor caminar de regreso a casa y disfrutar al máximo lo poco que quedaba del la luz día.

My early birthday gift was a plane ticket
in your direction, the North Pacific Current will carry me there.

I name it, a little prayer deep in my heart.
I call it forth, what is coming, is coming on foot.
Whether it takes days or years,
I have set my course; the intent is strong.
There is no wavering here;
the sails are already high
–and the wind is too wise.

My mother says "tomorrow is your birthday,
and we haven't bought you a dress and a pair of matching slippers"

I laugh

She's been so busy packing for her next trip
that time snuck up on her, again

I smile and lean my head against her shoulder
I want to tell her she is enough
of a present for me

and that when I am old
and unable to find her
I will observe her here –in this moment–
And I will dream of waking up in her house
under the bugambilias, again
Her caress sweet; her flesh warm

As I understand it, we all become momentary pilgrims
gracious wayfarers recounting our life's blessings, as the body reaches
its end, so whilst at the beginning

all I can manage to tell her is
"sabes que esas cosas no me importan"

she smiles
I think she has always known

How can I become more of myself?
What can I give?
Have I given enough ?
Whose eyes should I borrow ?
And what shoes should I walk in ?

Judgement does not keep company with truth;
Have I cleared my mind?
Have I opened it wide enough ?
What perspectives need to be placed down?

They got up this morning, the man in the cold blanket on the side of the metro station.

The woman who opens her shop early, the taxi driver at LAX, the kids that hurry to catch the bus–they all got up today.

Life rises from the breath of those around you –feel it rising from your own; yes, there is struggle, but gather strength and admire how everyday we all begin again.

I have laid lilies at your door, close your eyes and smell them; there is nothing pretentious about them.

There is no bill enclosed in the greeting card nor needle tucked between  the stems. It has been a gesture of love, simple things that grow
like moss on rocks and pearls in oysters

I have laid them gently, made a horticulturist of myself

I have worn big hats and ventured into my own fields
to snip the loviest of the bunch –and in my basket I always gather for two.

One for my kitchen table and the other one for you

I remember the sway of paper boats in the tub, their short lived buoyancy seems fragile now.

The hair dye my mother uses, gets a shade of brown lighter each year when more of her hairline begins to whiten.

My father’s light brown irises float in a sea of sclera; they look deeper.

My brother files my nails trying to prep them to classical guitar standards  and makes me sing scales with him. I’m always flat; it makes us laugh.

I sit on the porch steps writing poetry– tearing the unsuccessful ones out and folding them into airplanes; how far will they fly?

(Noon goes, and despite the cyclical rotation of the earth when I close my eyes I feel grounded; how can a second feel so infinite? )

I had the sudden thought “...and I’m the thing he doesn’t mind losing”

It was a little tornado of thought that I quickly put inside a mason jar and placed on a wooden shelf in my living room.

I sat on the couch across from it observing it and watching it stir.

“What a thought”

How destructive it could be to let that little storm out. It could grow and it’s winds could slowly start to peel off the walls and start to take down the roof.


So, I closed my eyes, cupped my hands and I thought of your smile–warm and tender. When I opened my eyes, a seedling had grown over my left palms.

“How beautiful”

I contemplated putting it in glass encasement, to watch it from afar, but instead I decided to take it outside and plant it near the middle of my front garden.

“This is what I want to cultivate” a flourishing sprout of life; a garden of plenitude.

As children, we would line up shoulder to shoulder at the edge of the swimming pool trying to figure out who’d jump in first.
One of the boys would always attempt to throw the other one in. Sometimes, you ‘d hear the cold holler of the skinniest kid ,that couldn’t hold their ground, splash into the water; the laughter of the other boys slowly dissipating through the air.

Kids grow and learn fast. As we grew up “everyone got smart” and instead of one casualty we would end up with two. If someone tried to push you into the pool, you would turned around and lovingly hugged them. As you fell in, so did they.

We played that game for a very long time –and I knew how to play that game. It was the other games and the other things that slowly changed that threw me out of whack.

Like high pitched voices, acne, and *******; only the chubby boys grew *******, too. The chubby ones and I were told to wear bras. It was a joke for one of us and a requirement for the other one.
...
We would line up shoulder to shoulder, and although the boys grew so much hair , as they got older, my back was till the hairiest one. At least there was one furry constant.



© Guadalupe Salgado Partida

1.
The car speeds past the pedestrians walking across the street
When did life become unwelcomed?

The public schools around the Banc of California Stadium are low in funding. Kids in hoodies with old text books and underpaid teachers make their way through the heavy traffic on buses and in cars.

When did the prosperity of life become selective?

The grass, the trees, the flowers, bloom through the cement cracks.And an inner city scholar, bound for college likens this image to their life.

when did creating unnecessary struggles for life become useful?

2.
An older woman with a grey sweatshirt and three bags is sitting on the steps of a gym while the security guard tells her “you cannot be here” . While a few feet from her, a young man taking a lunch break finishes his sandwich.

“When did life become unwelcomed”  I hear the pigeons above her sing, as they try to perch over the clear spikes
their song nesting deep within my mind

I am alive and there is warmth inside my chest
The sun again makes its trajectory over the sky into yours
Standing at the door of dreamworld
Half anchored,  eyes closing
I begin to understand that the warmth in my chest also rises