Long Listed for the 2023 Griffin Poetry Awards
https://griffinpoetryprize.com/press/2023-longlist-announcement/
Having no Trade
It was getting dark, and they still hammered along putting
together on the gallows, they hadn’t heard the great news
about blood, they didn’t know I had escaped, and I was
already licking the sugar spilled on the floor to conceal
the steps of the maid so they wouldn’t fire her.
However, I had to survive too, I had to find a job; I went
to the money changers who send me away since the birds
flew low and grabbed the gold off my hands; I sat outside
The church and people threw the holes of their eyes in my hat.
Everything was finished in the cemetery, in the light rain,
with a few cheap cognacs at the local tavern, which will have
its place in the beyond.
I remember the night when I played the role of the doll
and all the dress pins they poked in me, when I die, will
guide them to come and find me.
Since then, I’ve been left with that wind-whirl of the dog
that’s gone mad. When they’ll find it outside the city, it’ll
have a bit of froth in its mouth and the cut of an indescribable
image in its eyes: like the heroes’.
Libros Libertad 