Today I decided to “write back” to yesterday’s poem. I’m uncomfortable with its relative clarity. Whenever I write like that I feel I’m going the wrong way, and one way to solve that is to dive into the contradictions, and poke fun at myself a little.
I haven’t been titling most of these poems because they’re so new, but I’m wondering if an epigraph for this one would be Julieta Venegas’ line, “No dejes que nunca se olvide tu historia, vuelve a contarla” (in my translation, which you shouldn’t trust completely: “Don’t ever let your story be forgotten, come back to tell it”).
I was hesitant to link to the songs. One of the rules of the voice of “poetry shoulds” in my head is that the reader shouldn’t need it. But in case someone is curious, I figure it’s a courtesy to save you the searching.
Of course, of course: that’s not the whole story.
It’s a story. Of course. I was listening to Taylor Swift
but my biggest truth in all her exaggerations
is the mutual shrug at the end of “Story of Us”
(bigger than her distraught-poet-like thrashing or
that actor who is nothing but the Hollywood version of A.),
the act almost lost as the recommended videos cover the screen.
We were each looking to fill a role: I know it couldn’t have worked.
Now when I hear John Mayer sing
“I can’t wait to figure out what’s wrong with me”
in that song of that fall,
I’m just thankful I never wasted the time.
I mourn the distraction A. started
from what really mattered to me
and I think of what I never would have done,
never would have felt (like the pride of not losing
my head completely in that disaster of a marriage).
The limit of these songs is, despite my drama,
there has been no Great Lost Love
(at least, not among those
who would accept a second date).
Really, now at 43,
there’s Julieta Venegas on one shoulder
(Mejor, desenvaino una melodía),
Miranda Lambert on the other
(You know it ain’t my fault or
How to win when you play the fool, or better
That’s why the good Lord made bleach).
And Natalia Lafourcade, surrounding herself
in a crowd, in the spring of 2020 apparently
(why is it she’s always in the center
of human circles in her videos?),
reminding me of the charming ease, the ability
to dance and perform and so much more
that is not my birthright.
But we can learn, even if we never finish:
languages, finding and keeping, a new story.
Una vida no basta, lo sé, indeed.
2 responses to “Napowrimo Day #7”
I think the links add to it, but you don’t need to know the songs to feel this poem. A lovely conversation between the two poems.
Thank you–I’m glad you liked them!