Monday, July 10, 2017

ANNABELL MANJARRÉS FREYLE



ANNABELL MANJARRÉS FREYLE


PIECES OF MEN

men
pieces of men under foliage
men transformed into pain
pain of terrible weeping
tears boiled in agonized prayer
pieces of men cut into fourths
the fifth part is still crying underneath the house
the house is not human
the fifth part screamed louder than the chainsaw
a device invented by men
men with their extremities still stuck
to their trunks like trees
trees were the first to encounter it
they also fell screaming
their leaves screamed
their birds screamed.

The men in pieces have screamed
and the darkest part remained in their mothers’ navels
the most visceral in their wives’ temples
the most viscous part in their children’s drool
the most eloquent carries messages of fright
the shattered part
belongs to their friends.

Pieces of men packed together
in no one’s laws
the blood of no one is transfigured
in the thicket at the pier
they sleep in black bags
their pieces among the rocks
I have not seen them
they’ve told me
this country has told me
on this sand
the same wet, dry, uneven sand
spread out among animals
even to common hells.

This country is a common grave
they plant pieces of men
germinating incomplete men and women
their guardian angels have failed
dark entities triumphed over faith
Today, those who bury them
are a procession of jigsaw puzzles.

Beasts were born in that house
the house was built with pieces of fallen trees
in the sea
a hand searches for any face
to close its eyes
and the stilt shantytown is ashamed.

They’ve told me
I have not seen it
this country tells me
before sleeping
the national hell
a symbol ripped into useless flags
flags divided into two men
men screaming Yes
men answering No.
A bird of prey flies over
men in pieces
the bird perches on the national crest
no one has told me
I’ve seen it on top of the palaces
and since then
my happiness is wary.





AMPHIBIAN SOLITUDE

A morning can shed
the shells that it breathed yesterday and regret them under the sheets.
A machine of flesh stands up without the ghost of pride,
surrendering to sleep a few minutes more
under the sheets, under the rug, under an unknown guilt.
On the bedside table,
a teacup without tea or coffee opens its arms to you and says:
“Push the rock to the highest point, little Sisyphus”.
You know it would do no one any good to see a rock at the peak
but the gods compel you.
Overwriting your name, enclosing it in a circle
will not return it to the one who sighed yesterday.
Your name is your dress;
your surname, your jacket:
Annabell Naked Manjarrés Freyle.
And, of course, your shoes are not your destiny,
but they can walk it.
You’ve watched time go to sleep,
oh yes, you have:
the body veering towards a corner,
in the attempt to reconstruct the speeches yesterday sighed.
And who sighs today begs all of the longing for return to go back to sleep
and lull the infantile desire
projected on cozy sheets
and portable illusions.
It would be easier to accommodate desire to what comes or annihilate it
so that the days of water or earth are excellent.
In any case, making the bed
would be like dressing the name
of the one who receives your body alone.





I NO LONGER READ TAROT

The midday mirage
showed me
the drowned dancer
was only humidity.

And in the afternoon’s stupor I could see
the faces of those who
disguised as God and conjugated me.

I expressed my ignorance to them
as the only truth
and I became
a shoddy believer.

I ruined all predictions
burning the cards
from shuffling them at random so much.

I took a fistful of sand…
threw it at the sea.
And the sand was my fate
and the sea was nothingness.

There is no reason for a creature of crystal
to see beyond night.
There’s no point.
The swords that hacked me to pieces
lie on the ground with my primitive blood.

A distant woman
is the blood that circulates within me with her metallic perfume,
with her oxygen from the spring
who did not know how to name things.

I no longer read Tarot, it’s true,
because it made
fate out of everything I wanted
alongside the sum
of loose words which
I uttered irresponsibly.

The reflections that drained me
were arriving from afar
approaching me in the moment,
and regardless,
from that moment’s truth
I received nothing
but
existence.

ANNABELL  MANJARRÉS FREYLE

ANNABELL MANJARRÉS FREYLE (Colombia, Gaira. 1985): Communications specialist and journalist. Poet and storyteller. The Office of the Governor of Magdalena awarded her first place in poetry and second place for short story in the Poetry and Young Person’s Short Story Contest in 2013. She is the Bueno y Breve National Short Story Winner of El Túnel magazine from Montería in 2015, which she won with the story El hombre en su jaula [The Man in His Cage]. Author of three unpublished volumes of poetry: El Espejo Lunar Blanco [The White Moon Mirror], Óleo de una mujer acosada por el tiempo [Painting of a Woman harassed by Time], and Animales invertebrados [Invertebrate Animals]. Her poems have been translated into English, Catalan, French, and Italian, and appear in various national and international anthologies. She has written an unpublished collection of short stories and is currently working on her first novel. The next selection has been traslated by Ana María Correa:



3 comments:

  1. Dear Poetess Annabelle. Your words can be read, felt, and seen. In, "I No Longer Read Tarot", (of which I have seen the cards,too.) Your write was vivid, and alive with magic. As if the cards were here, lying on my table. And, "what" could they mean? I "exist". Wow. Loved your work. My name is Barbara Suen from the USA !

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  2. Delicious lines, to the last bite.

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