Robin Ouzman Hislop

Poet

The Triumph of the Left Hemisphere Parts (i-iii.) Poetry by Robin Ouzman Hislop

by 
The Triumph of the Left Hemisphere

(i)

cobwebbed her face spun the spell of lechery a garden of forked paths  
day and night tremble on the morning and evening star
morning brings the gull’s squall surreal beyond the curtained windows
the trees are ivy clad in a laurel bay like ship mast  & rigging sunk 
to the bottom of the sea

a filament of silver stabs the heart a slumbering breast cloud 
blooded in night’s music on no breath of breeze 
& flesh on flame trembles beneath naked branches 
churlish fetching as though milk maids were wenching 
like little red riding hoods 
nor no kiss can seal our wound to heal not her him, him her not I nor mine  

Godlike creation must be seen  as producing monsters  
in the gilt mirror of crooked butterflies where paper boats float with gondeliers 
beneath its arches and children drown in innocence of the first reflected face
new ice age  melts into soft ultra violet great maws devouring fleece 
ascend the statues of the sky  towards melting blue     
a sky in chains Atlantic winds mast banners 
wave musk of weed overgrown graves

paper castles on glass tables doll house tombs golden curls & dimples
from ghost houses screams the jackal down the long white hall
down the long white mall city of bleach close to the wind's white corners
ballerina in a champagne glass cherry lips sparkling eyes golden hair
delicate toes in bubbling foam until the last sips disappear in ripples
a pink & white cloud mattress washed to pillows of bleached stone
crepe clouds plume a three cornered hat pistols bloom back roses

The Triumph of the Left Hemisphere

(ii)

the first line on the page thought to escape its life sentence 
like an errant angel falling into the breach 
a heavenly ape descended & disappeared into the waters
transfixed the statue  wears the same mask as the crowd transfixed 
heaven & hell are on the spin of a coin 
blue whales' melodies turned to shrieks are the ocean's voice 
& the iceman cometh to explain the glory of a name by which he would be forgotten

write thin rice words to the roll of rice drums give alms to blindness 
papyrus on a brain stem in a ventilation shaft 
rivers of red ink we scratch fears of the trembling vertebrate 
the long field shrew fleeing the hill to frozen waste
rice burning the paper sky small bones in the stubble frail nib at the edge 
forlorn the streets we drift we drift on waste on waste no fiesta for the poet
no poem for the feast walk down walk down the western lane take heed
the locusts come take heed the rice fields are burning on west on west

as string tautens bow stretches arrow pivots arcs the long day crane 
drops its breaking neck everyone imprisons in the telescope
a bleached pine branch floats its sodden joint wrenched 
first came fresh in sweet pods & green mush splitting on
black lips black omnipotent tongue heart’s red blood trickling to feed  
gorilla sky rains cockroaches singing in the rain all the milk white spilt heaven
coquette ruffles & coiffed wigette wrought in cream meringue ostrich plumes

& the newsman comes on measure of all things who rose from the glaciers
first dialectician of interlocution to a third person in hypothetical 
argumentation of an imaginary plot fallen man in a museum in narrow straights
in the gallery on the knoll moulds without holds different helmets in the battle 
black out at the shoot out banquets in display of poison bouquets
thaws to time's articulated perception a line with no other representation 
but its manifold variation the mirror is all fur through trees convoluted 
branches whose littered scales spangle down wind their voices 

The Triumph of the Left Hemisphere

(iii)

mother of god in the death pen she's dancing on a string
a marionette at the gallows she sings as she swings one big world 
yes on everbody’s lips her mouth stains the mirror with a kiss
after the eightfold city of light the morning hymn on high
where the dragon fly pays homage to the lotus to fame with Mozart 
in another room from another room with another name on the radio made in china
drift like a broken antler in the soft silt quick on the swivel still unslacking 
raging silent till torn aloft close your eyes 

                                                                on your borders for now it’s safe to dream
& awake from a parallel dream of unknown separation where you reach out before
bandaged banisters spiral as a monstrous thorax throttled on each gargantuan 
gargoyle floor a white electric cell stormed in the head  of a whale that flounders
crashes onto the street of harlot shouts to become a reed at dawn 
kept by the river of day & night kept by the sea in a window
where the raven shrieks dressed like a black flamenco
& every one spills in the shapeless sky 

                                                             shedding rags in pirouettes
dark shards piercing the sunset in proportion to gravitation
yet they whispered she knew not she only her beloved called on lonely raven ridges
still her icy wails flail on bitter winds not freedom from your rags 
raised to riches by the coolies amongst those dark satanic mills
a shadow slithers crankily down funicular stairs onto trap door landings 
& narrow long doors through high thin halls like a crooked shank pin
out in black satin gold  buckles on 

                                                      Nantacas seven seas Rip Van Winkle’s 
away to hoods on the wharves manacled bicycles in interminable rows 
implore the shore’s deserted canals a town’s tier walls stained in moss fungi 
lichen grime belies their fragrance drain pipes in rainwild weed corners
dandelion leaf red bramble in black warts rain runs as blood  into shadows 
its speechless phantoms amazed after so long still misunderstood
in shadowy strands thin bands like the oneness of ant waves or piranhas 
long gone dance in the womb of incubation a well of gravity that spawns the ocean’s 
unleashed shoal still trembling from the deeps where you hover in suspense

 
 
 

 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules and Next Arrivals, collected poems, & Moon selected Audio Textual Poems available at Amazon.com as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
 
 
 

When the Messiah Comes poems from Aieka by Daniela Ema Aguinsky Translated from Spanish by Amparo Arróspide & Robin Ouzman Hislop

by 

i.

La foto de mi abuela el día de su casamiento

Sé que no lo deseabas
pero lo hiciste.
El buen chico judío asignado
no resultó
tan buen chico.

Pasé tu edad
no me casé con el mío.
Lo deje ir lejos
una noche de luna
en la terraza
tomó mi mano y dijo

no me gustan las chicas
con las uñas pintadas.

Las mías
eran rojas
y dejaban marcas
en las paredes de su intestino.

A veces recuerdo al goy
de la fábrica de máquinas de coser
gritaba tu nombre
en la cueva privada de su boca.

Alegre
soprano de interiores
fósforo
en una caja húmeda
durante un corte de luz

vos empezás a irte
yo recién estoy llegando. 

i.

The photo of my grandmother on her wedding day

I know you didn't want to
but you still did.
The assigned good Jewish boy
did not turn out to be
such a good boy.

I am past your age
I didn't marry mine.
I let him get away
a moonlit night
on the terrace
he took my hand and said

I don't like girls
with painted nails.

Mine
were red
and left marks
on the walls of his intestine.

Sometimes I remember the goi*
from the sewing machine factory
he screamed your name
in the private cave of his mouth.

Cheerful
indoor soprano
a match
in a wet match box
when there is a fuse

you begin to depart
I'm just arriving.


* Goi (non Jewish boy)

ii.

Palimpsesto

Me tiré ácido
me raspé la piel
y me escribí encima.

Abajo quedaron huellas
los textos que no llegaron
al canon de mi existencia.

Que vengan los cabalistas
los estudiantes de Talmud
voy a desplegarme sobre la mesa,
una escritura sagrada.

Desnúdenme con cuidado
rastreen los indicios
discutan el estado original
de esta mujer borrada.

ii.

Palimpsest

I threw acid on myself
scraped my skin
and wrote on it.

Traces were left below
the texts that did not make it
to the canon of my existence.

Let the Cabalists come
students of the Talmud
I'm going to spread myself on a table,
a sacred script

Undress me with care
track the signs
discuss the original state
of this erased woman.

iii.

Las copas están hechas para romperse

Lo sé
desde que mi abuela guardaba la vajilla
de su abuela, en un aparador especial
que nunca se abría
por lo delicadas que eran
esas copitas verdes de tallos finos como lirios
capacidad mínima, brillantes.

Nada ameritaba
perturbarlas
de su estado decorativo
los nietos no le habíamos dado
una jupá, un compromiso, un nacimiento.
No le habíamos dado nada.

Pero mi abuela sabía mejor que nadie
que las copas
están hechas
para romperse:

van a quebrarse
mientras lavás los platos
o estallar contra el piso cuando levantás la mesa
un día que estás sobrepasada
o se le van a caer a tu nieta, dentro de veinte años,
cuando se mude sola a su primer departamento.

Van a resistir
como las personas viejas resisten
hasta quebrarse
un día cualquiera de sol.

iii.

GLASSWARE  ARE  MADE TO BE BROKEN

I know
since my grandmother put away the crockery
of her grandmother, in a special sideboard
she never opened
because of how delicate they were
those little green glasses with thin stems like lilies
bright in miniature capacity 

Nothing was worth
disturbing them
from their ornamental state     
grandchildren hadn´t give her
a chuppah*, an engagement, a birth. 
We hadn't given her anything.

But my grandmother knew better than anyone
that glassware
are made to be broken

they are going to break
while you wash the dishes
or explode on the floor when you ´re clearing the table
stressed out
or your granddaughter will drop them in twenty years´ time
when she moves into her first apartment alone.

They will resist
as old people resist
until breaking
any sunny day.

* chuppah: a Jewish wedding

iv.

                Cuando venga el Mesías van a curarse todos los enfermos
                     pero el tonto va a seguir siendo tonto.
                      Refrán Idish

Cuando venga el Mesías

y reconstruyan el Tercer Templo
no quiero estar arriba
mirando a los hombres rezar
en círculos que cantan y bailan
mientras mujeres charlan
y chicos gritan.

Cuando venga el Mesías
no quiero estar arriba
con el humo de los sacrificios
abajo los sacerdotes entran
y salen como amantes
pronunciando
el nombre sagrado.

Cuando venga el Mesías
y todos retornemos a la tierra
quiero estar en la tierra de este mundo.

iv.

                   When the Messiah comes, all the sick will be cured.
                        but the fool will remain a fool.
                         Yiddish saying

When the Messiah comes

and they rebuild the Third Temple
I don't want to be above
watching men pray
in circles singing and dancing
while women chat
and children shout

When the Messiah comes
I don't want to be above
with the smoke of sacrifices
the priests entering below
and exiting like lovers
pronouncing
the sacred name.

When the Messiah comes
and we all return to earth
I want to be on the earth of this world.

v.

Teléfono fijo

Mis papás me dieron un teléfono fijo
la línea está incluída dijeron
tenelo por las dudas
y quedó en el piso

cuando suena, rara vez
sé que son ellos
(nadie más tiene el número)
me siento en el sillón
espero tres tonos y atiendo

a veces una noticia terrible otras
una invitación para almorzar
lo único fijo este teléfono.

v.

Landline

My parents gave me a landline
the line is paid for they said
keep it just in case
and it stayed on  the floor

when it rings, rarely
I know it's them
(no one else has its number)
I sit on the couch
I wait three rings and answer

sometimes terrible news other times
an invitation for lunch

The only fixed thing this phone.

Daniela Ema Aguinsky (Buenos Aires, 1993) is a writer and filmmaker based in Argentina. She Directed the shorts Virtual Guard, Hurricane Berta, 7 Tinder Dates, and several others. She published Amante japonés, Aieka (2023) and Terapia con animales (2022) in Argentina, Mexico and Spain, book that won The National Poetry Prize Storni in 2021. She is also the spanish translator to the California based poet Ellen Bass; Todos los platos del menú (Gog & Magog, 2021). Twitter: laglu Instagram: laglus

 
 
Amparo Arróspide (born in Buenos Aires) is an M.Phil. by the University of Salford. As well as poems, short stories and articles on literature and films in anthologies and international magazines, she has published five poetry collections: Presencia en el Misterio, Mosaicos bajo la hiedra, Alucinación en dos actos y algunos poemas, Pañuelos de usar y tirar and En el oído del viento. The latter is part of a trilogy together with Jacuzzi and Hormigas en diaspora, which are in the course of being published. In 2010 she acted as a co-editor of webzine Poetry Life Times, where many of her translations of Spanish poems have appeared, she has translated authors such as Margaret Atwood, Stevie Smith and James Stephens into Spanish, and others such as Guadalupe Grande, Ángel Minaya, Francisca Aguirre, Carmen Crespo, Javier Díaz Gil into English. She takes part in poetry festivals, recently Centro de Poesía José Hierro (Getafe).
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

Metamorphosis. A Poem by Robin Ouzman Hislop

by 
Metamorphosis

as the surge on the wave 
breaks to spray
turbulence becomes a vortex
a twisted relationship
between gravity and entropy
symbiosis
do the spiral galaxies dream
here in the helix of my heart
on on on the vortex trembles

the frozen rhythm of the traffic
outside like a broken melody
in the green foliage of the garden
new patterns appear everything living 
within a rhythm another personage 

world within endless worlds 
water & sand passed 
neither glass nor mirror 
through which one cannot pass
to a mirage wherein quivers a trace
beyond recall 	        metamorphosis

an alchemy of elements that assume 
their form with intent an event 
time reached in an unfathomable breach
the incomprable magnitude of multiplicty 
a world in all of its ever existences
transitioned into until now 
a universe 
that  devours & regurgitates itself 

time a dimension that 
ripples with its rhythms 
into a pattern of events 
transformed into entelechy 
in eternal metamorphosis 
a demiurge 
where fury of fire flood quake drought 
or rage of apocalypse	 
exploding skies  creeping pestilence 

or us between in a nebulous 
symbiotic moment 
where devils are angels & angels devils	
as nature in its rags & glory roams 
its own wilderness lost & found 
as life flows on
in eternal metamorphosis

Damn You All & No Mars Poems by Robin Ouzman Hislop

by 
Damn you all

wild cooing of doves in distant branches
beyond the curtain drawn window
 in the darkened room
where he sits on the edge of the bed
frail & thin gently nodding to & fro
thinking progress be damned

nation states wear hoods
ghost riders in the sky stampede
the plains & piss in the oceans
the salmon from the rivers have gone
in what seas will they now spawn
& he is down by the riverside

down by the riverside	            where
he casts his line into its waters
waiting for it to tauten     the sudden
tug     the thrill electric of connection
the flick     the jerk      as a wriggling
sparkling life           glints in the light
sails through space to land at his feet

the poetic stance
oh not at all	damn you all


“No Mars”

return to the Jaguar Moon
                                           what is perpetuation
                                          one is many is everyone
                                          is everything is a person
                                           a matter of perspective
                              she alone will adorn the many	Jaguar Moon
 
evolution is but diversity
                                        it will always come again
                                       but sapiens are but rapiens
                                            now their remains

                 if the world should come again 	then come O Jaguar Moon

the sleek Brazilian jaguar does not in her aboreal gloom
distill so rank a feline smell as grishkin in a drawing room

who is grishkin	   O Jaguar Moon
when she’s feline	& we her prey
unless we outlive the day
                                  
                               her kiss that sips our blood like nectar

 
 
 

Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author & https://poetrylifeandtimes.com See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

Six Poems from EL PLAZO (THE DEADLINE) by Olga Muñoz. Translated by Amparo Arrospide and Robin Ouzman Hislop

by

Six poems from EL PLAZO (THE DEADLINE)

16.
Desapareceríamos todos si las abejas murieran. Por ahora somos cuatro: dos adultos y dos crías que cargar en brazos en caso necesario. Pronostican una marcha tranquila, aunque el zumbido nos alcance en las próximas jornadas. Como alimento llevamos la oscura miel de la familia, indigesta, dulzona. Los nuevos evitamos derramarla, ya que una gota perdida trae la maldición de confundir las criaturas propias. Sin olerla llegó el animalillo de nombre equivocado, en medio del camino.

16.
Were bees to die, we would all disappear. Right now we are just four: two adults and two cubs to carry in our arms if necessary. In spite of the buzz reaching us in the next few days, a peaceful march is predicted. We carry as food for the family our dark sickly sweet indigestible honey. As the newly arrived we take care not to spill a drop as a drop lost would curse us into confusing our own offspring. Not smelling the honey, a little animal with a wrong name appeared into the middle of the road.

17.
Volvemos a casa con la cría y el espacio se ha hecho redondo. Las elásticas paredes ceden a nuestras voces. Parece que el hueco estaba listo desde hace meses, pues cada objeto ocupa su espacio densamente. Sólo a la llegada nos percatamos. Despacio penetramos el aire, conseguimos traspasarlo para cobijar a los nuestros.

17.
We return home with the cub into a space that has become round. The elastic walls recede with our voices. It seems the vacuity had been prepared for months, as each object occupies its own dense space. Only after arrival do we realize it as we slowly penetrate the air and manage to cross it to find a shelter for our own.

18.
No rodará, no caerá al vacío. No lo abrazará el aire, continente escueto al principio, península improvisada, isla final. Como en los trucos de magia, existen hilos invisibles, saliva que me ata a tres cuerpos y hace de mí una marioneta ciega.

18.
It will not roll nor fall into a void nor embrace the air, a bare continent at the beginning, an improvised peninsula, an island at the end. As with tricks of magic, invisible threads exist, saliva that ties me to three bodies like a blind marionette.

19.
Cada uno aguarda su turno para respirar. No nos vemos siquiera. Ocupamos salas de cristal con cuerpos transparentes, reflejados al azar. La gran mentira, el espejismo del aire. Mientras, las crías dormitan en la madriguera, repleta de oxígeno su sangre recién nacida.

19.
We each wait for our turn to breathe. We can’t even see each other. Our transparent bodies occupy glass rooms, randomly reflected. The mirage of air, a great lie. Meanwhile, the cubs are dozing snuggled close, their newborn blood full of oxygen.

20.
Escucha a su madre leer un cuento, la historia que lo espera al otro lado. Aún lo separan unos centímetros del designio. Un jabalí descompuesto en el bosque recuerda a ese niño alumbrado a la muerte. El deseo repetido de luna en luna, la tristeza rojiza del vacío. Mujer estéril que sueña al hijo con solo apartar la mano a tiempo.

20.
He listens as his mother reads a story, a story that waits for him from the other side. Yet still a few centimeters separate him from his fate. A rotting boar in the forest resembles the birth of the child born to death. The same desire passed from moon to moon, the reddish sadness of emptiness. A barren woman who dreams her son with only the withdrawal of her hand on time.

21.
Encontraste el sedal entre la arena, lejos del lugar del sacrificio. Casi caíste, y con todo tu cuerpo –uñas, árbol, océano– preguntabas qué era ese hilo. Te dimos palabras precisas, las más adecuadas seguramente. Nos pierde la exactitud. Aún así, siguen muriendo los peces de asfixia, con ese mismo sedal de tus dedos.

21.
You found the fishing line in the sand, far from the place of sacrifice. You almost fell down, and with your whole body – nails, tree, ocean – asked what was that thread. We replied with precise words, surely the most adequate. Exactitude is our undoing. But still fish continue to die of suffocation, with that same thread from your fingers.

Olga Muñoz Carrasco is author of the books: La caja de música (Madrid, Fundación Inquietudes/Asociación Poética Caudal, 2011), El plazo (Madrid, Amargord, 2012), Cada palabra una ceniza blanca (Valencia, Ejemplar Único, 2013), Cráter, danza (Barcelona, Calambur, 2016), 15 Filos (Madrid, Cartonera del escorpión azul, 2021), Tapiz rojo con pájaros (Madrid, Bala Perdida, 2021) and Filo (unpublished). Her editorial work is linked to the Genialogías collection at the Tigres de Papel publishing house and the Lengua de Agua collective. She completed her doctoral studies in Philology in Madrid, USA and Peru, and is currently a professor and researcher at Saint Louis University (Madrid Campus). In Lima she published her monograph Sigiloso desvelo- The poetry of Blanca Varela (Pontifical Catholic University of Peru, 2007). She prepared Blanca Varela’s anthology Y todo debe ser mentira (Barcelona, Galaxia Gutenberg, 2020) and in France she has just published her study Palabras para un canto. La escritura en espiral de Blanca Varela (Paris, Belin Éducation/Humensis, 2022). In recent years, her works have appeared in the field of Spanish-American and Spanish poetry. She is part of the research project “El impacto de la guerra civil española en la vida intelectual de Hispanoamérica” (“The impact of the Spanish civil war on the intellectual life of Latin America”) , which led to her book Perú y la guerra civil española. La voz de los intelecturales (Madrid, Calambur, 2013). She also teaches at the José Hierro Foundation (Madrid) and at the Diploma Course on Appreciation and Poetic Studies, Caracas (Venezuela).
 
 
Amparo Arróspide (born in Buenos Aires) is an M.Phil. by the University of Salford. As well as poems, short stories and articles on literature and films in anthologies and international magazines, she has published five poetry collections: Presencia en el Misterio, Mosaicos bajo la hiedra, Alucinación en dos actos y algunos poemas, Pañuelos de usar y tirar and En el oído del viento. The latter is part of a trilogy together with Jacuzzi and Hormigas en diaspora, which are in the course of being published. In 2010 she acted as a co-editor of webzine Poetry Life Times, where many of her translations of Spanish poems have appeared, she has translated authors such as Margaret Atwood, Stevie Smith and James Stephens into Spanish, and others such as Guadalupe Grande, Ángel Minaya, Francisca Aguirre, Carmen Crespo, Javier Díaz Gil into English. She takes part in poetry festivals, recently Centro de Poesía José Hierro (Getafe).
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times his publications include All the Babble of the Souk and Cartoon Molecules collected poems and Key of Mist the recently published Tesserae translations from Spanish poets Guadalupe Grande and Carmen Crespo visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds) .

Route Signs. Poems by Javier Gil Martin. Translated from Spanish by Amparo Arrospide & Robin Ouzman Hislop

by 

FIRST TERRITORY

        child eats crying
        child cries eating 
        in animal concert
	                
                     Blanca Varela

Lips that you have not used to kiss
little feet you haven't walked on yet
eyes which see just a foot from your face
hands you still don't know are yours
only
crying, hunger and sleep
and some furtive smile
but now comes life
beautiful Guille,
and  kisses will come and your steps
and your eyes will see to the end of the horizon
you will know your hands, and how to handle them
but don't forget, my child,
that crying, hunger, sleep
were your first territory.

PRIMER TERRITORIO 


    niño come llorando
llora comiendo niño
en animal concierto
	
Blanca Varela


Labios que no has usado para besar,
pequeños pies con los que no has caminado todavía,
ojos con los que ves a solo un palmo de tu rostro,
manos que aún no sabes que son tuyas;
apenas solo 
llanto, y hambre, y sueño,
y alguna sonrisa furtiva;
pero ahora llega la vida,
hermoso Guille,
y los besos vendrán, y tus pasos,
y esos ojos verán al final del horizonte,
y sabrás de tus manos, y sabrás manejarlas,
pero no olvides, mi niño,
que llanto, hambre y sueño
fueron tu primer territorio.


[Scars will come, my son...]


Scars will come, my son
and they will mark your body
but do not let them scare you because they will be 
your private dialogue with the world
a way to know you are alive 
full of past and full of present.

[Sobrevendrán cicatrices, hijo...]


Sobrevendrán cicatrices, hijo,  
y marcarán tu cuerpo,   
pero que no te asusten pues serán   
tu diálogo privado con el mundo,  
una forma de saberte vivo   
colmado de pasado y de presente. 


[The  many things you discover every day...]


The many things you discover every day. 
How to lean out with your clean eyes 
to this world full of sorrows, 
how to lean out and not soil everything 
with prejudices, fixations and miseries,
how will we do it without you telling us 
which path to take, which way, 
without us telling you
“This way yes, this way no, eat slowly, 
try not to stain your vest,
shut the door, brush your teeth...”.

[Cuántas cosas descubres cada día...] 


Cuántas cosas descubres cada día. 
Cómo asomarnos con tus ojos limpios 
a este mundo cargado de pesares, 
cómo asomarse y no ensuciarlo todo 
de prejuicios, esquemas y miserias, 
cómo lo haremos sin que tú nos digas 
qué vereda tomar, por qué camino, 
y no nosotros los que te digamos: 
“Por aquí sí, por aquí no, come despacio, 
intenta no ensuciar tu camiseta, 
cierra la puerta, lávate los dientes...”. 


NOT BEFORE

Wake up when
the light lets you
look at  your toys

NO ANTES

Despierta cuando
la luz ya te permita
ver tus juguetes.


[In addition to paying our pensions...]


In addition to paying our pensions,
it is expected of you, children,
(at least by poets)
a word that illuminates the world.
Like innocent little prophets
you sleep peacefully
you don't know yet
our secret assignment.

[Además de pagar nuestras pensiones...]


Además de pagar nuestras pensiones,
de vosotros se espera, hijos,
(al menos los poetas),
una palabra que ilumine el mundo.
Como pequeños profetas inocentes,
dormís tranquilos,
no conocéis aún 
nuestra secreta encomienda.


[How I wish my errors were of value to you...]


How I wish my errors were of value to you
a sort of hereditary apprenticeship
—I´ve a whole string of these to give you—
but only your own errors
with their taste of blood between the lips
will be of some use to you, if at all; 
most will be
irreparable and useless, like
a toy forgotten in an attic. 

[Ojalá mis errores os valieran...]


Ojalá mis errores os valieran
como un aprendizaje hereditario
—de eso tengo una ristra para daros—,
pero solo vuestros errores,
con su sabor a sangre entre los labios,
os servirán de algo, si es que os sirven;
la mayoría serán
irreparables e inútiles como 
un juguete olvidado en un desván.

Javier Gil Martin (Madrid, 1981). With a degree in Spanish Philology from the UAM, he is professionally dedicated to subtitling and literary proofreading and passionately to reading and editing, mainly poetry. He has coordinated, together with good friends, several literary collections. In 2020 he founded the publishing project “Cartonera del escorpión azul” and since 2006 he coordinates the “Versos para el adiós” section of Adiós Cultural magazine. As an author, he has published Poemas de la bancarrota (Ediciones del 4 de agosto, Logroño, 2015), Poemas de la bancarrota y otros poemas (Espacio Hudson, Argentina, 2018), Museo de la intemperie (Ejemplar Único, Alzira, 2020) & Museo de la intemperie [II] (Cartonera Island, Tenerife, 2022). His “Route Signs” is a section of the latter.

 
 
Amparo Arróspide (born in Buenos Aires) is an M.Phil. by the University of Salford. As well as poems, short stories and articles on literature and films in anthologies and international magazines, she has published five poetry collections: Presencia en el Misterio, Mosaicos bajo la hiedra, Alucinación en dos actos y algunos poemas, Pañuelos de usar y tirar and En el oído del viento. The latter is part of a trilogy together with Jacuzzi and Hormigas en diaspora, which are in the course of being published. In 2010 she acted as a co-editor of webzine Poetry Life Times, where many of her translations of Spanish poems have appeared, she has translated authors such as Margaret Atwood, Stevie Smith and James Stephens into Spanish, and others such as Guadalupe Grande, Ángel Minaya, Francisca Aguirre, Carmen Crespo, Javier Díaz Gil into English. She takes part in poetry festivals, recently Centro de Poesía José Hierro (Getafe).
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times his publications include All the Babble of the Souk and Cartoon Molecules collected poems and Key of Mist the recently published Tesserae translations from Spanish poets Guadalupe Grande and Carmen Crespo visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds) .

Forest Feline. A Poem by Robin Ouzman Hislop

by 
forest feline fir purring
    
dusks dawns this wastrel man
his vagrant days that like tattered
rags clothe his face 
as autumn leaves fall

we walk together now to listen talk
where both our persons are now
diminished 
before the tempest of ice
& fire consumes us once more

but soft ye now I will feed you with my blood

let me breathe your music as my words
already bawdy in the day 
with the pantomime we play 
on this our funeral day – hooray

    
i care not for the molecules of kings
nor the stratagem of regimes
where we walk diminished in our pain
& yet I say we will regain & you

    
will come again 	jaguar moon
forest feline purring your dawn dusk’s born
hawthorn & the rowan 	the red berries growing

a van flashes by our simulacra
i have nothing to offer you
but my blood in  your  music
beyond our most unreasonable crime

(before the human territorial voice in)
invades & after
the sun shines it’s sudden shine
our end begins

    
as I stumble through the straw
but this is beech place not pine
though i guess it’s the same decline
in the end                     & the skyline rang out release me


 
 
 

 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules and Next Arrivals, collected poems, & Moon selected Audio Textual Poems available at Amazon.com as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
 
 
 

Cowboys & Injuns. A Poem by Robin Ouzman Hislop

by

 
 
 

return the pastureland to nature

 

we ask too much of the cow

given the little we give back

let the predator the herbivore the pollinator

return

let the buffalo roam

O detritus spreader – but no

let the cow provide

the anthropocene is not only importuning

it is invading

there could be in the world

a discourse worldwide

but who speaks first

why does a plant become a tree

the forest is an orchestration

an instrumentation

not a tool

our hunger is as the hunger of the polar bear’s

eating us

 

more than a threat to an endangered species

we were that

that made you what you are

on a shoal of whales

 
 
 

 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules and Next Arrivals, collected poems, & Moon selected Audio Textual Poems available at Amazon.com as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
 
 
 

Beluga. A Poem by Robin Ouzman Hislop

by

 

white dolphin without wing

homing           drawing succour beneath the ice floe

where the river meets the sea
downstream from the forest
song of the ocean a sonic alphabet
a web of sound we have yet to know

moving northward with nowhere to go
until the gulf of mexico
here today gone tomorrow

your palace of ice

i listen now for your call lost to us

still i am here upon the shore

or perhaps you outlive us all
deep upon the sea bed’s eddies
don’t you already know? we listen
but do not understand at all

in those warm seas where you might roam
who is the predator & who is the prey?

beyond our simulation
our simulacra
anthropocene

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

 
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules and Next Arrivals, collected poems, & Moon selected Audio Textual Poems available at Amazon.com as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

Top O’Hill Video Poem Robin Ouzman Hislop

by

 
This is a YouTube Video in the public domain, script subtitles to the poem may be accessed in the caption box on the bar below the video, when in play.
 

  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

 
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules and Next Arrivals, collected poems, & Moon selected Audio Textual Poems available at Amazon.com as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)