100 Refutations: Day 31

Written by María Eugenia Vaz Ferreira
Translated from the Spanish by Lina M. Ferreira C.-V.

| | |

May, 2018

Only Poem

Sea with neither name nor shore,
endless ocean which I dreamt,
infinite and arcane,
like space, like times.

I wound its waves,
old mother of life,
death, as waves perish
and emerge reborn.
How much dying, how many births
inside immortal death!…
Playing a game of cradles and graves,
she was alone.

Suddenly, a wandering bird
crossed the stretch of vertical sea:
“Chojé!… Chojé!…” it said,
a whining stain flying by.

Then lost in the distance,
dripping: “Chojé!… Chojé!…”

I awoke, atop the waves
and flew away.

Bios

María Eugenia Vaz Ferreira

María Eugenia Vaz Ferreira (1875-1924) was a teacher, poet, dramatist, and musician in Uruguay at the turn of the twentieth century. She was known for being simultaneously cultured, charismatic, rebellious, and mischievous.

Lina M. Ferreira C.-V.

Lina M. Ferreira C.-V. earned MFAs in creative nonfiction writing and literary translation from The University of Iowa. She is the author of Drown Sever Sing from Anomalous Press and Don’t Come Back from Mad River Books, as well as editor, with Sarah Viren, of the forthcoming anthology Essaying the Americas. Her fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and translation work has been featured in journals including Bellingham Review, Chicago Review, Fourth Genre, Brevity, Poets & Writers, and The Sunday Rumpus, among others. She won Best of the Net and Iron Horse Review’s Discovered Voices Award, has been nominated for two Pushcart Prizes, and is a Rona Jaffe fellow. She moved from Colombia to China to Columbus, Ohio to Richmond, Virginia, where she works as an assistant professor for Virginia Commonwealth University. Visit www.linawritesessays.com.

English translation copyright (c) Lina M. Ferreira C.-V., 2018.