I’ve tattooed Maria on the forearms of your photographs.
Today at the flea market an instinct to surprise you.
Antique foreign postcards. A find
among the shoeboxes, 1907 Lesbian Romance!
Dramas! Bold damas declare their intentions
to our Lady of Pagola. 103 years ago she lived
on the same street as our rental! Imagine
young Carmen calligraphying Señorita Catalán
on the bare skin of the refined elite, re-inking
the hand-painted postales. I translate her Spanish
on the back of the decorated damsel, the one
with maroon roses and blue pastel. “The girlfriends
who want you cannot forget you, and to prove
my affection I dedicate to you this postcard.”
Kenward, I dedicate to you all I’ve found today
at the fería in 2010 Montevideo, from Avenida Pagola,
where jealous Clara Carrera sent Maria the child
holding her china doll. Rouged cheeks and lips
and Easter Sunday dress. “They can tell
you that they love you,” she warns our heroine. “An instant
can return itself to the sea. But to love you
like I love you… Lies. That can never be.”
I almost wrote on the two blank-backed
cards from the 1930s, but choose to let you
add your own amusing captions to their kitschy drag,
black-browed foreheads white and wide as blank canvas.
“All is sunny in Uruguay. Wish you were here.” And it is.
And we do. “Much love to the cats. We’ll see you in June.”
