Adobo Criollo Sergio Antonio Ortiz Rivera

the distance which lies between the branches with furrows on my face I've put on my mourning apron. there is an empty bench where I sit and die a little in front of the house. people walk by. I don't explain anything to you. a different death in the middle of the street. … I leaf through the obituaries and the clouds you look at me with fear, (my heart starts to slide down the gentle slope of your black hair.) … it rained because I needed it to rain, and because you wanted you gaze at me through the mirror. night came because I wanted it to come. and I looked into your eyes, and I kissed your childlike hands, and prepared your clothes, remember? but you were afraid. a sullen and grim fear. a fear of watches. remember, it’s all true. … I've not given up on either love or wound. … we never measure the distance which lies between the branches of the blooming dragon tree or r

tangled I am afraid, that's right, afraid of getting tangled in the barbwires of a dream afraid of your arms shaped like golden bars. Remember what other winters have meant to you: the sea, ships arriving without a single casualty,  the wind, remember the wind, my love, softening the corners.

Puerto Rico-My Bankrupt Island You’ve imagined, smiled, waited so long to meet me that you’re tired. Don’t ask for an explanation. Don’t take away the idea that I have, even when it’s vague. Please, don’t test me, on firm ground (you’d shove me aside). Sometimes, there’s nothing left of you but an illustration, a map. If and when you arrive, you approach, you think it’s alright, but it’s something else, something totally different, a hallucination. You've got magnitude and heat. But you’re the other side of the coin.

moriviví- tu caricia aquel día de marzo

You you were my sea urchin   my turtledove but your name was also Acacia my Cuban prostitute my día tras día tras día the absurdity of a loveless morning yes, you have so many names I can’t single you out as a single person my Juno my next trick but everything is such a lost cause that it really doesn’t matter what I call you the bathroom mirrors are all foggy my bear with a half beard my fifteen past seven my hundred petal lotus

Defeat I've never had a job where I could not go to Paris, have a serene day, and get married where writing a poem was like committing suicide at the sight of your large penis where you’ve said it yourself: I am not what I am or what I'm not where literature is lived rather than studied and the word "subject-matter" is                 synonymous of "mystery" where every aggression is a man looking for a flag where there’s no difference between the ordinary and extraordinary sexual encounters on the beach of existence where announcing me dumb at birth was actually a blessing, I stood by it for so many years that it started to feel like my soul