Christina Vega-Westhoff
from Suelo Tide Cement


it would grow through cement, erupting it.
as in without a plan designed or stolen
and combination of stolen design and
bankrupt & stolen out from under and
never were titled and the specifics
enormity. As in sovereignty in one
hand and the other—
……and the body—
& in the mind—
even with the design this ever constant
fractioning. to have been important
because _____
(identity) . the novel did not stop to
call (to be translated).
the land did not stop to be confused
missionaries of soil neither
to also be encasing the large building
the cement. the how many seeds of
_____.
how many supply side swindled.

…………Over the waves two kites
………that first seem too enormous fish
……or whales//
Our intentions are different,
the cry goes/
the guilt continuing / as
implications of the wealth of
the world are again & again thrown
before you.
………And again & again.
…………A scream/ a cry/
………the sky being emptied
………/a cow conniving(?) to glance
………at you while the rest run away.

/
the blue as in plastic gem jewelry
but not having been touched
and touching back—first a gentle slap
the wrist only slightly enreddened
but then in preventing and in the
thrust of responding the whole leg
marked by what could only be deemed
to be tentacles yet on the sand
seemed the most pliable unthreaded cloth—
for the cake of the little edoll, the incoming
tunas and re-representations of monarchy
so that the entering & exiting of her
most majestic opposing realms
and it is not to say or hear her
special day in timing repulsing
to have been unradicalized or deemed so
or in comparison yearning—what
did in saying envision—in visioning
the young nun as if alive

confessing the love's profession talked out of
or as in whole body lying beneath the table
enfolding * if the call could not speak envolumed
the illumined first bell ringing
/ or the shade enmeshing only
be as
on the bicycle also departing
with the gaze set in conquering
to measure, to measure again
the first sounds of music
from the cliffside or the boat in
passing
t-shirt overhead, neck & nearly eyes

as the shore expands
the shadow reaching more & more
what is ungraspable for maybe
an hour more
(between tide(s))
sun yet overhead
the kite, the sparrow,
the runner,
the reader of interviews
the swing set just back, in the grove
go beyond the ending,
or back to it
"where's my sweet ambrosial
chocolate or batido de piña"



Christina Vega-Westhoff is a poet, translator, and aerialist currently living in Panama. Her poems appear in Fieralingue, Spiral Orb, The Lumberyard Magazine, 1913: A Journal of Forms, Witness: A JLP Anthology, The Dictionary Project, Bombay Gin, and Drunken Boat, and her translations of Panamanian writer Melanie Taylor Herrera's work in Asymptote, Ezra, Metamorphoses, and PRISM International.