I believe that each of us is given one sentence at birth, and we spend the rest of our life trying to read that sentence and make sense of it.
—
Li Young Lee
Two Poems by Daniel Flores y Ascencio
- Two Poems by Daisy Zamora
- Two Poems by Daniel Flores y Ascencio
- Cockenoe by David Rattray
- The Hidden Anguish of the Mouseketeers by Gary Indiana
- Spring Training by Glenn O'Brien
- Not Many by Isabel de los Ángeles Ruano
- From “San Francisco Libre” by Isidro Fuentes Castillo
- Whatever Happens by Jacek Gulla
- He Watched Me by James Purdy
- Three Reels from Guatemala by Janet Rodney
- Cemetary by Joaquin Pasos
- The Following Myth of Romantic Suffering Has to be Done Away With by Kathy Acker
- Strands by Kimiko Hahn
- Three Poems by Leonel Rugama
- Three Poems by Margaret Randall
- To Fernando by Michele Najlis
- So You Understand Once and For All by Miguel Huezo Mixco
- Two Poems by Otto René Castillo
- During the Mornings by Raquel Melendez
- Deudas (Doubts) by Reina Maria Rodriguez
- Five Poems by Roque Dalton
- 8 by Roberto Obregon
- Enigmatic Salts by Roberto Sosa
- Estare aqui (I will be here) by Rene Castilla R.
- Five Poems by Rosario Murillo
- To Roosevelt by Rubén Darío
- Three Poems by Vidaluz Meneses
- Acceptance Speech by Julio Cortázar
- Dark Love by Aaron Zuckerman
- Two Poems by Ana Ilce
- Two Poems by April Bernard
- In the High Ceiling of Stars by Bradford Morrow
- Not Only the Smile Was Seen: Caprice by Carlos Martinez Rivas
- Laments in Space by Clementina Suárez
First Proof
- Warriors Have Funny Heads by Francesc Torres
- Untitled Photograph by Gianfranco Gorgoni
- Christ in the 21st Century by Gin Taylor
- Escena Campestre by Hilda Vogl
- Palm Sunday, Century City | L.A. by Hope Sandrow
- Red Mask by Hunt Slonem
- Jack by Ira Richer
- Completion of the Circle by Italo Scanga
- Open (Entrance/Exit) #2 by James Ford
- Montezuma by James Nares
- Seated Woman by James Perry Walker
- Three Photographs by Jean-Marie Simon
- Untitled Drawing by Jim Kopp
- Elios Bailan by June Beer
- Blind Man’s Bluff by Vitaly Komar & Alexander Melamid
- Keon by Lan Payne
- The Long Prayer I, II by Lee Quinones
- Ancestor by Luis Frangella
- Ranas by Maka
- Two Photographs by Manuel Alvarez Bravo
- Two Paintings by Martha Diamond
- Nkrigom by Nick Ghiz
- Untitled Painting by Pam Wye
- San Pedro Lake, Atitlán Guatemala by Phyllis Galembo
- Death Flaunts Its Lover by Richard Hoffmann
- Untitled Photograph by Amanda Means
- Protection en la Tormenta by Carlos Arias Vicuna
- Macho Raton con Paisajes by Carlos Montenegro
- Woyzek by Edward Brezinski
- The Mad Sea Captain Charts a Course Up the Amazon by Richard Mock
- Two Sculptures by Ruth Vollmer
- Three Photographs by Susan Meiselas
- Camellian by Tina Girouard
- Female Acrobats by Tom Otterness
- Sketches by Joe Lewis
More
To Die of Love
A tree
A verse
A dove
From love I am trembling
and I am cold
crazy cold with anguish and joys.
The dying
little by little
makes me sick.
Exile!
I want to die
all of a sudden
Zaz!
so suddenly
to feel the impact
of my body in battle
against yankee fire.
To feel, then, nothing more—
Dream
of the fertile land
Dream
of life at play
Dream
of peace.
Ruth Vollmer, Musical Forest, 1961, 9½ inches diameter. Courtesy Jack Tilton Gallery, New York.
A Question of Life
Death
ambushes at every corner
and at times
brute sentiment
and rage
distend my heart
like a stretch sock.
Between life
and death
is an ongoing battle.
One is like an old shoe
and the other like a bare foot.
At times I like dry flowers more
than the fresh-cut
and at times death,
it seems fruitless,
and, life so alone.
Translations by Zoë Anglesey and Daniel Flores Ascencio.
Daniel Flores is a painter, poet and filmmaker. He is Founder and Director of the Institute of Arts and Letters of El Salvador in Exile, INALSE.
Related
Staging historical justice in Hernán Ronsino’s Glaxo
“A writer worried about reception is cooking a dead book. A writer’s job is to produce the best possible book in absolute freedom, so the category ‘acceptable’ does not play in the process at all.”
From the train I could look out onto the infinite blue of the sea. I was still exhausted, wakeful from the overnight transatlantic flight to Rome, but looking out at the sea, that Mediterranean sea that was so infinite and so blue, made me forget it all, even myself. I don’t know why.
Originally published in
BOMB 9,
Spring 1984
Nicolas Echevarria, Pam Yates, art by James Nares and Tom Otterness, writing by Daisy Zamora, Kathy Acker, Glenn O’Brien, and more.
