03-06-2024
ire’ne lara silva
BLOOD·SUGAR·CANTO
this is what they will not tell you
and this is what you must know
if you hear nothing else i say
hear this
you cannot live in fear
you cannot heal in fear
fear will never make you stronger
fear is the language many doctors speak
they’ll say this is going to kill you
your organs are being bathed in acid
amputation dialysis coma death
and when the body does not obey
as the doctor demands
more pills
more insulin
more syringes
more often
and it will wear on you
the constant battle of
necessity versus necessity
a box of syringes
vs
gas money
the price of sufficient insulin
against
the cost of groceries
testing strips and lancets
vs
the light bill
the cost of one healthy meal
vs
the cost of three fast food meals
another co-pay
and another co-pay
vs
the cost of not seeing the doctor
they will say there are no choices
but there are always choices
though the choices
we make out of fear
are not choices
fear is a prison
fear is worse
than the disease
fear
takes
everything
some will say this is war
war raging within us
blood turned against itself
our bodies falling in battle
the enemy everywhere
within and without
but the word war
turns us against ourselves
and the word disease
renders us victims
and the war is unending
and a war always claims
casualties
in a war
there is no room
for dreaming oneself well
and the first part of the dream
is learning to listen
to your body and to your blood
it is not as simple
as
eat this not that eat that not this
take this not that take that not this
do this not that do that not this
you learn to listen
until you are the one writing the song
and the daily challenges
are the discordant notes
you must work into the score
making something more beautiful
than what there was before
not planned not wanted
but more powerful
because it is truth
but the music
will not come
if you are afraid
music like most things in life
enters in only one of two ways
el amor o el dolor
through love or through pain
i know
no one said
we were worthy of love
no one said
we were precious
or that our lives were gifts
no one said
let us learn to love ourselves
heal ourselves
care for ourselves
care for each other
teach each other
how to begin
with this essential task
of
loving ourselves
i will begin here
with these words
learning love
one utterance at a time
i will not
live
in fear
i will make song
SOLEDAD
(written with Moisés S. L. Lara)
whispering when he sings whispering we are the last memories before waking whispering when he sings when he sings no mourning did not come no we keep forgetting we will not remember there were ghosts here before death came there will be ghosts here after the living leave know that mourning did not come no no remembering no forgetting
silence came in the dark and stood in the morning light silence held the broken sounds silence shifted in its chair and silence made the beds silence ran outside embraced all the dead trees silence turned off the lights and told the walls to fall silence left and left the gate door open inviting in solitude there is no place where solitude has not entered
he woke so many times in the night never calling for anyone but with stories spilling out of him memories bruised from handling and memories never touched perfectly preserved and dangerous they left splinters they left glass they left spines they imploded and ate parts of his soul he woke so many times in the night and woke me so i could listen
there are words born of silence words born of violence others have always entrusted to me even before i knew what loss was they lived like blooms within and every new story is like rainfall fear of death fear of alone fear of being abandoned fear of pain others bring me their stories i could only bear them because i had song songs to make me strong
whispering when he sings whispering i always wanted to hear his voice singing he never understood what medicine it was never wondered what invites in the song what is the darkness descending inside and out how do you climb the song towards the light life sings life sings we keep forgetting we will not remember only the song remembers
silence came in the dark and stood in the morning light silence held the broken sounds shadows don’t sing shadows eat the silence and let it out again silence ran outside where there are no more gardens and the earth beckons with its stillness no rivers here silence left and left the gate door open there is no place where solitude has not been
LOVE SONG FOR MY ORGANS
this is a song i didn’t know
needed singing needed singing
a song for each morning
a song for each night
offered with awareness
offered with gratitude
decades have passed i did not
know your colors your shapes
the work you do have done
or what you needed from me
now i know this song needs singing
i will sing it everywhere i go
i name you now breathe softly
upon you hold you tenderly within
kidneys
you are not forgotten never
you are cherished and i am grateful
i bring you rainwater and riverwater
i bring you flowers tiny blue flowers
i bring you these my two hands filled
with sun light with starlight
i sing you strong sing you whole
and thank you for filtering my blood
heart
be strong little heart as strong as you
have ever been you are my life
when i am still i hear your beating
feel it in my chest hold you close
in a dance that will not pause while
we are living i envision the flow of blood
flowing to you flowing from you moving easily
moving swiftly through wide open blood vessels
pancreas
you have been sleeping little warrior
it is time to wake time to speak again
i will bring you morning serenades
cascading flower petals and trilling birdsong
you fought the rising glucose hordes fought
until you were spent until you could not go on
years now i have lived on foreign insulin
always approximate subject to wild swings
of not enough too much almost in time
i long for your fine tuned calibration
i see you rising i hear you murmuring
words spoken at dawn i greet you
liver
lean i dream you lean see you lean and dark
brow furrowed ferociously inspired sculptor
ferociously creating ferociously shaping each
work of art as if it were the first time the only time
as if you were recreating the ocean the stars every minute
you are not a factory not an assembly line
i bring you milk thistle i bring you flax seed in thanks
you are re-creating my life your art is my life
nerves
you tell me stories without you there are no stories
without them i would know nothing understand nothing
of the world within or the world without
you are the carriers of lightning of moonlight
you tell me i am alive you tell me i am safe
because of you the exquisite the tender of my life
and also the pain and also the hurt the sharp the ache
but tell me stories i will always be listening
skin
hot breath tender touch running bare-fleshed in the rain
the warmth of the sun the chill of winter days the wind
my boundaries my beginnings my endings my whole
life the whole world written on my skin my skin sings
i will bring you gifts in thanks jojoba aloe avocado sweet
almond oil cocoa butter calendula shea butter and lanolin
eyes
for me everything begins with you I could spend days staring
at the sky day or night or morning or fog or thunderstorm
so much sweetness in looking at green leaves bright colors
loved faces blossoms rivers rainfall sunshine long roads
in my memories everything begins with what you’ve given me
i remember my life in a million images you brought me
and all the words of my life all the books of my life
for all the flames and the moonlight all my gratitude
gratitude
kidneys.…heart….pancreas….nerves
liver….skin….eyes….all my body
please forgive any harm
i have caused you
thank you for this day for
every day you have given me
now i know this song needs singing
i will sing it everywhere i go
i name you now breathe softly
upon you hold you tenderly within
-from Blood Sugar Canto (Saddle Road Press), selected by Spring 2024 PoemoftheWeek.com Guest Editor, Sheila Black
ire’ne lara silva, the 2023 Texas State Poet Laureate, is the author of five poetry collections, furia, Blood Sugar Canto, CUICACALLI/House of Song, FirstPoems, and the eaters of flowers, two chapbooks, Enduring Azucares and Hibiscus Tacos, and a short story collection, flesh to bone, which won the Premio Aztlán. ire’ne is the recipient of a 2021 Tasajillo Writers Grant, a 2017 NALAC Fund for the Arts Grant, the final Alfredo Cisneros del Moral Award, and was the Fiction Finalist for AROHO’s 2013 Gift of Freedom Award. Most recently, ire’ne was awarded the 2021 Texas Institute of Letters Shrake Award for Best Short Nonfiction. ire’ne is currently a Writer at Large for Texas Highways Magazine and is working on a second collection of short stories titled, the light of your body. Her first comic book, VENDAVAL, will be released by the Chispa Imprint of Scout Comics in April 2024. Website: http://www.irenelarasilva.wordpress.com