The Steps Poem by Blanca Varela

And this "where to"? So dry and so distant
that I pause to hear it return to my body,
to feel it enter the blood spewing forth
in circular motions where I stood,
immensely sad among all my things,
so close to the cage where my red parrot screams,
and my beautiful belt from the North (from Piura or Chiclayo, I don't remember).

As a child I gave so much,
as one who counts until death,
as one most pure and cruel.
One for the butterfly or for the cat
that died so quickly,
or one for the mother,
to mourn over her dark and odorless skirt,
over her belly that I still love like a home,
a fishbowl, a cool and shady nest.

There are others. Each one of them gives pain,
the one of thirst leads to water
and the one of love is empty, toothless,
this heavy meal that throws me into the blackest weeping,
into strange simian postures,
laughing with teeth bared,
smiling like some carnivorous plant.
But all of the steps,
together, loving and killing themselves,
in sum, are like a human walking,
dangerous instrument against peace.

United, they watch the sky with patience.

Translated from the Spanish
by Carlos Lara