Author: Luisa A. Igloria

Of course the bird was on the payroll of the witch. Little sneak, little tattle-tale, it took its fill of crumbs then flew off to let her know she could throw more wood into the fire: Dinner’s coming! The moon shone fitfully through the trees, its face of salt-raised bread as porous as the tales whispered to children in their beds. What’s that glinting under the trees? The smell of sugar wafts through the abandoned house like bad mojo. But what if she were simply a foil, a decoy, an easy target for the bones of a different story; some gypsy, homeless waif herself, subsisting by her wits alone at the edge of the world? Eventually, tresses begin to resemble a nest of twigs where there’s no call for hair appointments. Of course it will seem as though we stirred whole stews out of thin air, rolled dough into darling dumplings shaped like babies. I think the usual language for it is Making do. If I were you, I’d search for politicians lurking in the trees. If I were you, I wouldn’t believe all the stories I heard. Women are always getting a bad rap. Even the girl sitting alone in her room, stroking the fur of her cat, can wind up being blamed for stuff that disappears from the kitchen downstairs. Especially the one reading a book.

In response to Via Negativa: Hansel and Gretel revisited and lost: a story in eight pictures.

Zealots aplenty, in these days of misplaced belief; sure,
you can’t tell if the guy in the seat next to you’s an
ex-convict, but it’s just as difficult to discern
whether the suit across the aisle might have a moral
vacancy beneath all that expensive Italian wool and seemingly
unblemished perfection. A cultivar’s a plant variety
that’s forced from selective breeding— We’ve all heard
such histories: the dusky nanny under the pecan tree
reaching for her breasts and popping them into mouths so
querulous with hunger they don’t wonder why one tongue is
pink against the nipple’s dark areola, and the other
onyx. That’s a different time, people will say.
Nostalgia makes the past seem better. In the present,
meanwhile, we suffer the public bungling of fools
looking to ascend to public office. Wisdom,
kingliness, humanity, hope: we’ve grown wary,
jaded from exposure to their magnitude of lies.
Isn’t it time for the season to turn?
Have all the birds flown south for winter?
Gather the tender-leaved indoors and shield them
from the coming frost. Scarlet-lined, afternoons look
especially beautiful in autumn. It’s almost as if
death might never come reaping. Destiny’s a work
cobbled from castoffs. So come over here,
buy me a drink, offer your shoulder; buy us
a little more time before it all comes down.

In response to Via Negativa: Autumnal.

Deckle. Deckle— I like the sound of that.
And I like the sound of riffled papers,
of the bookmaker folding sheets and tearing
pieces off along a straight edge, by hand.
Then there’s the unexpected: discovery
of a paper cut along the thumb, sudden
script of water poured over its envelope flap.

In response to small stone (169).

The curtains part, the lion roars to signal the beginning of the story. The clatter of the reel in the silence of the hall, the grainy colors on the film. A woodpecker drills holes in the wood: repeats, repeats. You sit in the darkened theatre on a worn velvet seat. A woman’s face comes on the screen, as if in rapture though flames lick at her bound feet. It’s always like this— there’s danger at every turn, or the tedium of long afternoons as days shade toward winter. You learn to carry your own epiphanies. I prefer the versions with no dubbed captions: the eyes say so much more, and hands are good for gestures. Before too long, music foreshadows the closing credits. A scroll floats before your eyes with the words The End.

In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.

Black rice cakes rolled in sugar
and thickened with coconut cream.
Aroma of singed banana leaves.
Juice from cane or fermented rice,
sediment in the jar. Hungry,
always hungry— here
they come, asking for more.

In response to Via Negativa: Next Life.

while you want nothing but to be

undone— To grow sleek in the dark
and unlayered in light; to be the girl,

no, all the girls who danced so much
they wore holes in their slippers,

even after the room was locked
from outside and someone threw

the key away— And the poem wants
a shirt to shrug way down its

shoulders, it wants a heap of agate
beads to slide like fingers

across its breasts. Wrap
a woven tapis about its hips

and thread the spines of skinned
reptiles through its dark hair;

under a moon round as a gangsa,
feed it rice wine sweeter than vodka

and make it tell of the night-blooming flower
that shows its face only once a year.

In response to Via Negativa: Unknitting.

An exercise: they pass the paper cup from bow to bow.
The teacher tells her student, All is memory—
how fingers clasp the wood so they will know.

We learn by doing, especially when things don’t go
the way we might have wished. Technique isn’t accessory;
it’s the calloused fingers mastered by the bow.

Full measures laid upon the flesh: no time to cringe from what we know.
We’re here, we’ll pass; but must believe there’s more than misery.
Within this kitchen’s quiet chill, I clasp you and I know.

The days, soft grey, will fill with signs presaging snow;
but music sifts through branches still, more etched than scenery.
We’ll gather kindling with calloused fingers mastered by the bow,

then fill the cups with warmth. Filched comforts might bestow
a moment’s ease, could knit affections with no boundaries.
The soul remembers what it clasped, so it would know.

As many times, repeat the lesson till the sinews know.
Exacting teacher, your syllabus is the fragmentary—
We pass a flame like breath from bow to bow
and clasp the wood as lightly as we know.

In response to small stone (166).