Things had to be this way

Between July and October 2016, I took a backpacking trip, accompanied only by that backpack (or rather, a suitcase) and the complete works of the poet Amiri Baraka (1934-2014).

It was complicated to carry more books on the trip, so in order to make the most of what would be my only reading during those months, I did an exercise: I assembled a text using loose, random lines from 27 of Baraka’s poems in their original language (English) and made a free translation, that is, an imprecise one, changing words and order at will, with the aim of joining everything into a new poem.

The first draft was 15 pages long and, after a slow process of revision, ended up being just 5; in this way, the lines were still a bit of Baraka, but now also a bit mine. The intention was to find a middle ground. Here is the result:

Things had to be this way

          every night I count the stars

and every night I get the same number

          but when there are no stars to count

then I count the empty spaces.

Will I ever be capable of joy?

          Part of my charm generates electric feelings,

a bit of nostalgia that suddenly

          turns into terrible thoughts of death.

How stupid it is to be so sentimental

          as to call anything love;

my mouth is wide open

          but I have nothing to say,

that too is part of my charm.

As simple as the act of opening my eyes

          before the stairs where my tears crash,

it is useless to speak of something like time

          because ghosts will cover your flesh

trying to hide behind lies,

          like the demonic sphinx rising at dusk

I think about how the seasons pass;

          as simple as the act of closing my eyes,

I have forgotten the color reflected on the hills,

          I have forgotten everything,

you said you loved me while trying to understand the clouds

          and the light.

Sometimes I feel I must express myself

          and then whatever needs to be expressed

falls from my mouth like ash or like scales

          and when those scales harden

everything seems made of green light;

          I suppose color can erase uncertainty,

anyway now everything is made of green light.

Pretending to be someone special I resurrect in the mornings;

          there must be something intensely brilliant in this world,

a mystical cure,

          something to make your enemy surrender against the wall

but without rage

          just feeling happy because from a balcony

someone notices that you triumphed,

          and so years later, when you ride the bus,

you look at how it is your invincible hand that grips the metal

          even though by then you are old.

The surface of the earth tries to set limits on violence,

          last night, talking about us, we loved each other,

if I think intensely about myself

          then the misery of my life is not so certain;

practicing solitude is a virtue

          a necessity we never knew we had

who cares that it had to be this way?

          Love is movement

but I can also tell you without moving that I love you.

I am inside someone who loves me,

          I look through their eyes,

I sense their breath turning into sound,

          warm air blows across my face,

this is human love and I live inside it,

          I was born to die where love opens in my arms;

now we can be something less miserable

          because between us there is heroism,

this is the dance of true rebellion.

Can you hear me?

          Here I am again

I am your dynamite,

          can you hear me?

My soul moves,

          it is the soul you gave me,

I say my soul and it moves,

          it is the soul you gave me,

I am tired of losing myself behind masks

          because I cannot love quietly,

this is a long story,

          our enemies would not be so powerful if we made love:

the word love is a piece language uses to fight.

Who am I to love deeply?

          How much is too intimate?

Sometimes I live against the night,

          against the sharp-edged tables of bars

and I don’t know how to find out if someone is looking for me;

          I have learned to repeat the sound of my bones,

I see that I love what I shouldn’t love

          but I am what I think I am

and you are what I think you are;

          in your dreams the beasts have devoured me,

silence is as important as our own life

          but it is a clear truth that we have abandoned each other

and you are unable to feel how fast I am moving toward death.

My heart is wide enough to contain some history:

          a poem is nonsense unless it becomes a tree.

Who are you listening to me?

          Who are you listening to yourself?

I am sure there is someone you love

          and I am sure that sometimes

that someone can be me.

I know you are not god, but you are everything I believe in,

          ideas are reflections of material life,

I am visible,

          I have the capacity to be seen,

the problem is that you do not always see me.

When the sky was far away

          and when poetry was not real

I used to be ignorant and silent,

          I used to be an excited child,

I used to think everything had a soul,

          I used to think the dead were dead forever,

I used to cry if I needed to lie

          and I used to think love had a solution;

but what love is not fragile?

          What love is not in danger?

All this pain

          is indispensable.

Photography by Nicholas Dominguez Gallegos