I don’t comb my hair
or paint my waif face
or clothe my scant body
in matching colors.
Who sees them now?
I do care for this body
I wash it, and oil it for comfort,
eat seeds and nuts
and greens.
For it contains my words
That I still send, more fervently
than ever to those
I love.
And to those
who’ll never see
This waif face, this
uncombed hair.
I care for these rooms that I’ve
made pleasant, these cuttings
in the window I hover over
Like nurslings.
Scrub this kitchen where cockroaches come out at night
to celebrate crumbs on the counter,
an unwashed cup in the sink,
Scatter at the light.
Dust these bookshelves where
I preserve a few books printed in cuarto edition
whose creamy pages I sliced open years ago, to discover
a language,
This bronze cook pot so old
its bottom was made rounded
to nestle in embers…
Brasas.
And on the walls
this wooden chocolate beater
carved by hand and purchased in a market
for centavos.
This weaving of a monkey
with a triangular green face,
this linocut
a friend…
For these rooms contain
this scant body now,
which contains
these words.
Barbara de la Cuesta taught and worked as a journalist in South America, and is teacher of English as a Second Language and Spanish. Out of this experience came her two prize winning novels, The Spanish Teacher, winner of the Gival Press Award in 2007, and Rosa, winner of the Driftless Novella Prize from Brain Mill Press in 2017. Fellowships in fiction from the Massachusetts Artists’ Foundation, the New Jersey Council on the Arts, as well as residencies at the Ragdale Foundation, The Virginia Center, and the Millay Colony, have allowed her to complete these novels. She has also published two collections of poetry with Finishing Line Press and her collection of short stories. The Place Where Judas Lost his Boots has recently won The Brighthorse Prize for short fiction.
