Perderte (missing You)

Adriana Winkelmayer

“Article one: (...) the second number of article two and the second number of article six of the Law on Vagrants and Criminals, dated August 4, 1933, are worded as follows:

Article two.- Number two.- Homosexuals [sic], ruffians, and pimps. (...).

Article Six.- Number Two.- Homosexuals [sic], ruffians and pimps, professional beggars, and those who live off the begging of others, exploit minors, the sick, or the disabled, will be subject to the following measures for them to comply with all of them successively.

a) Internment in a work establishment or agricultural colony. Homosexuals [sic] subjected to this security measure must be interned in special institutions and, in all cases, with absolute separation from others.

b) Prohibition of residing in a certain place or territory and obligation to declare their domicile.

c) Submission to the supervision of the delegates.”

- The 1954 reform of the 1933 “Ley de vagos y maleantes”(“Vagrancy Act”)

≈

Pesadilla

It seems as though the air is not worth breathing

Sour and industrial is the smell of leaving

Before it only smelled environmental

And now all that is left is reeling

In the vigorous coastal wind

In the unforgiving slant of the sea

While with two hands and one God

He takes her away from me

Parece que el aire no vale la pena respirar

Agrio e industrial es el olor de partiendo

Antes, solo olía a ambiente

Y ahora todo que queda es tambalearse

En el vigoroso viento costero

En la implacable movimiento del mar

Mientras con dos manos y un Diós

Él la aleja de mí

≈

Comportamiento

As a child

When my mother died

My father did not let my brothers and I weep

So we kept

My father told us to succeed so

We excelled

My father told us to find love

So we did

My father told us to find our passion and purpose

The only difference being

That one became a CEO

And the other an army engineer

I was relegated to wifehood and the wishes of a husband

But now I wish someone had knocked on my door

Thrown a rock at my window

To hold me and let me cry

Knowing now that it wouldn’t have made a difference

De niña,

Cuando murió mi madre,

Mi padre no permitió mis hermanos y yo llorar

Entonces no lloremos

Mi padre nos dijó que tener exito

Entonces tuvimos exito

Mi padre nos dijó que buscar el amor

Entonces lo encontraremos

Mi padre nos dijó que buscar nuestros passiones y propositos

La unica diferencia:

Que uno se convertió a un director

Y el otro un ingeniero militar

Y yo era puesto en la vida de una esposa y deseos de un esposo

Pero ahora espero que alguien vinó a mi puerta

Tirado una piedra a mi ventana

Para llevarme y dejarme llorar

Sabiendo que no haría una diferencia

≈

mi sol, mi cielo

I’m afraid that

Like Pandora’s box —

If I open too fast

I might never stop opening

Falling toward

Into and through you

And never stop flowing through the oceans in your eyes

And morph into you, we one being,

And like a constellation of stars

And I may never find my way back out again.

Tengo miedo que

Como la caja de Pandora –

Si me abro bastante rapido

Nunca dejaría abriendo

Cayendo hacia,

Dentro y a traves de ti

Y nunca dejar nadar de los oceanos de tus ojos

Y me transforme en ti, nosotras un solo cuerpo

Como una constelación de estrellas

Y nunca encuentre mi camino de regresar

93

≈

la maldita carcel

It’s morning

My first time without you beside me in bed since June and

I am heavily aware that we are currently detained.

I am in bed at our house

There is a permanent shape left empty on your side

The air is now thinner in these mountains

The flowers rot - the river muddies - and the woods smell of smoke This

mattress is suddenly as thin as my patience

I haven’t contemplated murder until this moment

When I will visit you at the prison later today

It will only be thanks to my father

To my brother - To men

The money they pay

And the face I save

But I cannot kiss you

Hold you or heal you

I am terrified and heartbroken

That is my prison.

Es la mañana

La primera vez sin tu cuerpo a mi lado en la cama hasta junio y

Estoy bastante consciente que ahora estamos detenidos

Estoy en cama en nuestra casa

Hay un hueco vacillo en tu lado

El aire es mas delgado en esas montañas

Las flores se pudran - el rio es sucio - el bosque huelle como fumacion Este

colchon es de repente flaco como mi paciencia

Nunca he pensado en el asesino hasta este momento

Cuando te visito en la carcel hoy

Solo sería possible por mi padre

Mi hermano - a los hombres

El dinero que pagan

94

Y la cara que mantengo

Pero no puedo besarte

Llevarte ni apoyarte

Estoy aterrorizada y desconsolada

Eso es mi carcel.

≈

la rabia

Fina, why did you have to be taken When I couldn’t hold you or kiss you Or curse the Guardia Civil to take their hands off you Why was I so careless Why did I insist on seeing you in the park Why did that man put his hands on you Why did your father have to die so suddenly Why did I kiss you in the store last March Why do I unravel when you come near me Why did love finally make sense when I felt your skin on mine Why are our souls intertwined Why do death and torture seem so much less frightening now Why is our love at the mercy of men What god lets those in love be condemned WHAT GOD LETS THOSE IN LOVE BE CONDEMNED

Fina, porque tuvieron que llevarte Cuando no pude abrazarte ni besarte Ni maldecir a la Guardia Civil para que te quitaran las manos de ti Porque fui tan descuidada Porque insistí en verte en el parque Porque ese hombre te puso las manos encima porque tu padre tuvo que morir tan de repente Porque te besé en la tiendo el pasado marzo Porque me deshago cuando te acercas a mí Porque entendió amor cuando sentí tu piel sobre la mía Porque nuestras almas estan entrelazadas Porque la muerte y la tortura parecen mucho menos aterradoras ahora Porque nuestro amor está controlado de los hombres Que dios permite que los enamorados sean condenados QUE DIOS PERMITE QUE LOS ENAMORADOS SEAN CONDENADOS?