There is a poem in my head for you,
From a long way back.
I remember you Johana
in your little cane house
and your four children
playing in the mud.
Pretty, the colour of honey
Woman/child
The contraband between your breasts
And your smile giving us light.
Johana in your bicycle
bringing me breakfast
of fried plantains and rum.
Friend jumping for joy
in the puddles of your yard
on seeing me arrive
When you, he, I, all
Were healthier, prettier, better.
In a world where one is worth
What the last cent,
I know I counted on you.
Johana always to my rescue;
That day for the escape
you lend me your sandals,
another day you came to fetch me
in a cab.
My only friend Johana.
The horror of your instant death
an afternoon of Easter Saturday
Pa! Pa!...papapapapapa!
Pa! Pa! Papapapapapapa!
I Heard from my house
Nine millimetre discharge
resounded in
the distance
and at that moment someone fell
How to imagine it was you,
with your
pretty face, oh Johana!
I miss you, your memory smarts in the distance.
I see your mother sitting
In a corner of the market,
Her round figure
And her skin darker than yours of honey.
Her effervescent smile and her red mouth today faded,
Nodding off over her basket
from exhaustion, from sorrow
from so much frying fish
Oh! From so much burying corpses.
your father, her mother
And now the unthinkable, you, Johana.
From the other side of the ocean
I am sending you this homage
I hope that you will receive it
There where there is no money,
drugs or semiautomatics.
And I ask myself
I don’t dare...
Johana, did we all kill you?
@Paloma Zozaya Gorostiza
