Goodbye Bouquet
Our goodbye
tasted
something like
full-bodied
music composed
on flesh with
touches of light
and oak
mixed with salt
from my tears
and your skin
it tasted of
your hands
holding my face
while you pulled
my lips to yours
never parting
your dark eyes
from mine
it left
traces of
mocha and
berries
weekends
and wine
hints of passion,
joy, sorrow
and love
our goodbye
tasted of you
and me
writing now
alone
New York in Our Hearts
The sun shines in Ohio like any other spring
peeping out every four days or so
some rays even warm my bare skin
children ride their bikes
while neighbors sow seeds of light
in their gardens flags wave happily
as people pass by walking to the park
with their dogs
you can hear the singing
of the birds that tend to their nests
and I swing on the porch of my house
with the sway of sadness thinking
constantly about my violinist son in New York
he traded the stage for his dorm room
and the spotlight for the sunbeams
that filter through its window facing Grant’s tomb
the sole audience to his performance lamenting
the spread of death through the air
these days we all have New York in our hearts.
Alone
Not your powdered sugar lips
or the freshly cut mango
sprinkled with chile flakes
Not the hint of red wine in your breath
or warm bread straight from the hearth
no memory can sweeten
the bitter taste of eating
Sunday breakfast alone
Jennifer Rathbun, poet and translator, is a Professor of Spanish and Chair of the Department of Modern Languages and Classics and Interim Chair of the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Ball State University in Indiana. She received her PhD at the University of Arizona specializing in Contemporary Latin American Literature. Rathbun is the translator of numerous poetry books by Hispanic authors such as Alberto Blanco and Minerva Margarita Villarreal, editor of two anthologies of poetry and author of the poetry collection El libro de traiciones / The Book of Betrayals (2021). Rathbun was awarded the 2021 Ambroggio Prize by the Academy of American Poets for her translation of Cardinal in My Window With a Mask on its Beak by Colombian author Carlos Aguasaco. She is a member of the American Literary Translators Association (ALTA) and is Associate Editor of Ashland Poetry Press. Rathbun translated Indran Amirthanayagam's Blue Window (Dialogos Books, 2021)