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para minha mãe
PURAQUEQUARA, 1953–TAMPA, 2014
Saudade, or longing, is the desire to be transported from darkness into light, to be touched by that which is not of this world.
Nick Cave, “The Secret Life of the Love Song”
Though they die of nostalgia, they’ll never return.
Eduardo Galeano, The Book of Embraces
CONTENTS
The Last Time I Saw My Daughter’s Eyes, They Were on the Back of a Moth’s Wings
1 The Last Known Sighting of the Mapinguari
2 The Unconfirmed Miracles at Puraquequara
4 In Which the Chorus Describes Cafuné on the Eve of the Passion
7 A Camera Crew Films a Televovela Based on the Miracles at Puraquequara
8 In Which the Chorus Explains What Was Stolen in 1966
11 In My Third Trimester I Dream My Own Death
12 In Which the Chorus Provides a Possible Chronology
1 Better to Marry Than to Burn
3 Incomplete Address to the Lord
5 In Which the Chorus Proposes Performing Nebuchadnezzar’s Dreams Instead of the Passion
7 After Waking from a Seven-Year Dream
8 In Which the Chorus Sees an Incomplete Vision of the Future
13 In Which the Chorus Acts Out What May Be a Love Story
1 After the Boto’s Autopsy Reveals a Nautilus Where the Heart Should Be
