she turned into a dolphin like her father and followed him
to the Orinoco where his bedtime stories feature laundry, jacaranda
blossoms, and a lovely hunchback with seven fetishes — collars, corsets,
cuffs, scratches, spankings, strap-ons, and dolls in leather shoes —
or my daughter is the tree-shaped tumor in my skull, or the echo
of a lullaby, all lonesome song and no body, or she’s a character
in the book authored by my inner voice, the one where my mother
is limping but alive, and my father escapes from prison,
and we eat guaraná grown from the left eye of the boy
whose grave opened to greet his weeping mother and a forest
rushed out, a child’s eye ripening in the mouth of every bird.
A Camera Crew Films a Telenovela Based on the Miracles at Puraquequara
I rehearse my lines as I palm a maracujá to test its tenderness
and say, Não, Comandante, and, More rum, cadela. Day in, day out,
I eat the same fried bread and ripe plantains, wash the same sheets,
keep saving the saved, the baptized rising from the river,
awed and dripping, living their scripts. Though my memory
of the execution differs I stand on my mark and clap.
I try to recall my insincere lamentations in the funeral parade.
An extra in my own story and envious of the ingenue’s unmuddied
shoes and air-conditioned hotel room, I say, Ajudar, ajudar,
and cry on cue. Between scenes an actor shares imported cigars
with the prostitute playing me. When cameras roll, he bites
her nipples with his prosthetic teeth, and my milk lets down.
Sweet white ache. After the mayor hangs himself and bequeaths
his second-best bed to his horse, I write romantic obituaries
and send his wife signed photographs of myself. I make love
to avoid sweeping the sidewalk, to practice geometry, to satisfy
the voyeur and come with uncertain pleasure. Only when the film crew
leaves do the dead reappear, drinking, dancing, whipping each other
with TV antennas. They burn with more heat than light.
Pictures from that night reveal a black horse dragging a priest
through paradise, the crowd weeping, at last, with happiness.
In Which the Chorus Explains What Was Stolen in 1966
MARIA DE LOURDES
One candidate swore he’d import artists from Paris to paint every voter’s portrait.
MARIA HELENA
But the wiretap revealed that of the six masked balls and two bullfights he promised, he only planned to pass out free twelve-packs of Guaraná Antarctica on election day.
MARIA APARECIDA
One candidate skipped town when someone caught him digging up a body and reburying it beneath the courthouse.
MARIA THEREZA
Another rumor said he was caught tattooing women after curfew, inking diabolical love letters onto their ankles.
MARIA MADALENA
He was part of a conspiracy of windmills, others claimed.
MARIA DE LOURDES
They said his chickens accused him of unspeakable things.
MARIA HELENA
When we arrived to cast our ballots, the soldiers at the polls handed us a picture of the general leading the charge against the Bolivian army and a picture of the president’s house stormed by sailors.
MARIA APARECIDA
We all voted for the general twice, the dim X of our voice. We went to the town square, and danced with short men with long mustaches who buried their bristled cheeks in our chests and swore to help you when the borders open if we’d only let them sign their names on our thighs.
MARIA THEREZA
We tried to tell them, we did. We were born a century before them and will last centuries after. This was not a fear to run from. We liked it, their acrid sweat, their promises of a future.
MARIA MADALENA
One planned our escape in a canoe under a dead fisherman.
MARIA DE LOURDES
One said he’d pack us in a sack when he shipped his manioc.
MARIA APARECIDA
One promised to write us a poem whose music would transport us over the Andes, even if our bodies remained here.
MARIA THEREZA
My brides, said the first, offering a hook.
MARIA MADALENA
Beloveds, said the second, holding a rose.
MARIA DE LOURDES
Muses, wrote the third, slipping notes in each of our pockets.
MARIA HELENA
We chose.
After the Plantation Fire
We buried the bodies and danced — we had to.
Beneath the sagging porch, generators roared,
mosquitoes sated themselves on wild dogs, boats
approaching on the river loaded with soldiers
killed their engines. We told them the fire had nothing
