Shorter Posts

After we flew across the country we
got in bed, laid our bodies
delicately together, like maps laid
face to face, East to West, my
San Francisco against your New York, your
Fire Island against my Sonoma, my
New Orleans deep in your Texas, your Idaho
bright on my Great Lakes, my Kansas
burning against your Kansas your Kansas
burning against my Kansas, your Eastern
Standard Time pressing into my
Pacific Time, my Mountain Time
beating against your Central Time, your
sun rising swiftly from the right my
sun rising swiftly from the left your
moon rising slowly form the left my
moon rising slowly form the right until
all four bodies of the sky
burn above us, sealing us together,
all our cities twin cities,
all our states united, one
nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you, Sharon Olds, for your lovely poem.

A while ago, I found myself waiting for
you in a city on the other side of the world.
Rain had fallen for weeks, and even nights
were working overtime.

Was it in Dresden? No, rains there had turned white.
Vienna? No, only ghost rains of 1914.
Avignon? No, those rains spoke only French —
with an Italian accent.

Here in Rain City (wherever that may be)
Autumn had unbuttoned the golden dresses of the
poplars; they floated for a week in the clouds above
the other side of the river, like a canopy of incense.

At a window table in a café, I was drawing the terrazza
of an empty restaurant on the other side of the street.
Perhaps angels got hungry, perhaps you would appear.
Every night I was the only client there.

The waitress, round as a drum, and with the
voice of a little girl, often paused to
look at my drawing, and then at the colors.
She never mentioned rain.

Was it an aria from Tosca that she hummed?
(Or was that aria from La Traviata?) Perhaps it was only the
echo of vesper bells from the cathedral on the
other side of the City that opened the windows?

Where ever you were, dear Angel, you were here.
After the rains grew bored and floated on
to bless other cities, hungry guests
appeard in the restaurant, their glasses empty.

The sketch of the terrazza will always be a
mess, never finished. It held nights and rains,
arias of Puccini, and vesper bells. It held me.
And I too, an other me, waiting for an other you.

A few months ago my friend Isabel Navarro Sánchez told me that she had nearly finished writing her new novel. Would I allow her to use one of my paintings for the cover of the book? Well, of course, and with pleasure and gratitude.

The Silence of The Willow (El Silencio del Sauce), with its intriguing cover, arrived in my California mailbox a couple of days ago. The novel begins with a woman who disappears and continues as a story about daughters and mothers, about secrets, jealosies and vengeance, where home is not a haven, nor a refuge, but a place of menace and danger.

It has not yet been translated into English, but I’m enjoying the shadows and suspense and I’m sure Spanish speakers who love elegantly written mysteries will enjoy reading it too.