Hola.
Hi.
Wow.
The poems I have in this anthology are about a large
prison that was ripped down some years ago, el Oso Blanco,
the White Bear.
It's a very famous prison.
And its construction, I currently live in Villa Nevares,
which is right across from where it used to be.
"En las primeras décadas del nuevo siglo,
Cenex se puso en marcha.
Pero en ese siglo, betún había cometido un delito digno de
castigo,
Un robo de arroz y café y una deuda de grano, ron, y tierra.
La justicia, siempre excelsa, le encontró a pie en el camino
real, sediento de fuente.
Y aunque en el artículo uno quedaba prohibida la extracción
de esclavos sin permiso real,
El artículo 2.1 exceptuaba los sentenciados por los tribunales.
Le transportaron ante aquel cajón de la sastra
Con su estalactita pendiente donde las guardias revisaban los
reclusos.
Una detallaba los procedimientos y la otra los desvestía.
La española, con voz tallada, explicaba mientras la gringa
supervisaba la fila.
Una repetía con tono compareciente
Y la otra los miraba con odio fijo y manoseo firme.
La estructura en sí se debatía.
El estilo neomudéjar con su afán secular contenía un corazón
vacío de reforma,
Una gran plaza de ciudad española sembrada de flores
fugitivas."
And I guess for context, el Oso Blanco was built by enslaved
people and confined people, so it's a prison built
by prisoners.
"In the first decade of the new century,
so next began their march.
But in this bitumen century, they had committed a felony
worth punishment,
A theft of rice or coffee or a debt of grain, rum, or land.
Justice, always lofty, found Cenex on the royal road,
thirsty for a source.
And although article one states the extraction of slaves is
prohibited within royal decree,
Article 2.1 makes an exception for those sentenced
by tribunals.
They were transported before that crate of harvest with its
dangling stalactite,
Where the guards checked inmates.
One detailed the procedures, and the other handled undressing.
The Spaniard with the carved voice explained,
While the gringa supervised the line.
One repeated a tone appearing before the other with a fixed
hate and a firm hand.
The structure itself debated.
The neomudéjar style, its secular toil,
contained a heart free of reform,
A great plaza for a Spanish city planted with fugitive flowers.