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This poem needed
to be written down
I prefer
The rosary threader
to the renowned professor
The kaleidoscope seller
to the boastful businessman
The father of three
putting food on the table
to the cardinal CEO
and his glitzy kings
I don’t try to choose
between scroungers and politicians
both reek of garbage.

Translation: Marinka Yossiffon.

24th March 2006

All the horror
today
all the pain suffered
Makes me become a child again
brings back the sun
A flag is being raised
in front of that child I am
in whom I take refuge
-the fright-
Aurora is played
a cup of brewed maté warms the soul
makes the overall shine
which I put on again for a moment
to recover my country
that tale that one never believes
to the narrator
-the wolf in Little Red Riding Hood-
I sing again with my teacher
"pumpkin
watermelon
no tank will stop illia
not even ongania´s"
Growing up like this
being punched
to uniform thoughts
Names rummage through my mind
Those who left
It is always easier to erase names
words
to silence the conscience
Urondo dies again
today
Oesterheld left a cold wind
in our souls
which even poets of perennial singing
leaf
like villa crespo
cry for Mars cellar
we cry
The tears wash this pain that never ends
justice that arrives late
that does not arrive
Why they threw us to the river?
anticipating an endless sea
that from the eyes falls
the memory?
What can be done to change places
replace them
in the shadows
load the rifles of hope
shoot against death
hunger
with them
for them
tiny pieces of heaven
hidden among dark clouds
of cruelty
How can one disappear
even for a while
to have this cup of hot coffee
a white sheet of paper
to talk about death
that does not disappear
Do you want to take my seat
my breath
at least for a little while
to warm your cold soul?
Wickedness
blindness
that became god
satan
he gave you no-death
emptiness
in which his feverish eyes
wandering in the shadows
look for you and call your name
like in a tango
Thirty years is nothing
This memory wound
does not disintegrates
like sand
It lasts
it lasts
And despite the oblivion which destroys
everything
has killed my old dream
there is still a hidden humble
hope
which is all the treasure of my heart
Author´s Note:

The verses in italics are from Alfredo Le Pera´s tango "Volver"

Translator´s notes:
(1) The verses in quotes were a political chant during Ongania´s dictatorship. Arturo Umberto Illia was the 35th democratically elected president of Argentina. He was overthrown by a military coup led by Juan Carlos Ongania.

(2) The verses "leaf" and "villa crespo" both refer to the Argentinian poet Juan Gelman. "Leaf" is meant to represent Gelman himself as a leaf from the poet´s tree (poetree=poetry) whereas "Villa Crespo" was the neighborhood where Gelman was born and raised as a child. In the following verse, "cry Mars cellar", the author makes use of his poetic license with a pronunciation trick to make his readers pronounce "Marcelo", Gelman´s disappeared son during the dictatorship. The same intention lies on the original version in Spanish ("lloran a mar cielo").
Translation: Sabeli Ceballos Franco.

Mary’s Little Company

I could always depend on the Company
he says
as usual, at a loss for words

“I miss your company”
she writes from the plane
blubbering like a sloppy child
The same company once scorned
will later be detested

I am faithful to Mary
who accompanies me always

Despised by the godless
she rises from the desert
a pillar of smoke
with breasts like twin gazelles

My little
old
wrinkled
desert-mary
her feet dusty
her cheeks furrowed by tears

(Translation Marinka Yossifon. Ilustration, Jordana)

Cruci fix it (by Juan Daniel Perrotta)

If I were a priest
I’d walk through god’s streets
Blessing and greeting parishioners
Signing the cross on needy foreheads
Laying hands on the sick
who draw toward me like fishing-boats to a lighthouse

Alas.
I am only a poet
Condemned to be crucified in words
by his peers and disimiles
By those whose silver-tongued tangos
whine night and day
By those who beg for bread--and cheese
Without success

By cable t.v. subscribers
By the nouveau riche
smiling in Armani
By the hearse drivers returning from work
ready for burial
By the mothers who would sell baby’s new luxury car
to buy his heart
By the plaintiffs and the defendants
By pubescent babes with budding breasts
By the boys who never tire of stroking them
By the woman I love—and who loves me

By the (few) sellers of caramel apples
and the (many) sellers of powder dreams
By little girls of unconditional love
By the lawyer summoning the force of law
To approve extended poetic vacations

For those who read this poem
For those that don’t
For those who condemn it
For all of them—this paper
which once was wood
On which I sacrifice myself.

Translation: Marinka Yossiffon

Desire and Devotion

Two women watch me
From the nightstand
One divine in a celestial cloak
The other human wearing jeans

To the first, I dedicate sexual prayers
And trace the other with sanctified hands

The human deserves my love and desire
The divinity is a black hole
Into which I plunge
with bestial yearning

A cruel devotion
Desire

They both know and smile

They always smile
and watch me.


Translation: Marinka Yossiffon