LIA

A shadowsed heart is the heart of a leaf.
I dislike the living of unavenged lives. I let the sun rise each morning against the sky,
and I keep dreaming of the yellow faces of glad newsletters. But only you, dear, will ever respond to my cry.

There’s nothing closer to a dusk,
than the memory you brought me,
like fireflies trapped in a jar,
but they are much brighter than the sad gaze of a weeping willow.

No, not today you shall fall in the noise of flowers,
for the heavens have other rhythms,
held closely like tender palms. Ah, sugar sand, sweet ash, beautiful fruit, you evade me! But now I’ll sing for you all.

• Gabriela Mistral