Poem: "I've got my magic back" by Leticia Alaniz

I’ve got my magic back

Moon spells breathe out of my 

mouth and exhale Medusa chants. 

The black springs turn yellow, 

petal pink, and green. 

I left behind the rush and madness 

from the old. 

I’ve put on my high priestess robe. 

Pomegranate juices drip down

my lips.

They open the seeds of 

knowledge.

An altar of onions and fleur-de-lis

winds under my feet.

Lyrical songs sing 

turning leaves, shaking the

branches of my hips.

My body is hotly possessed in

the Minerva temple.

Vanilla orchids cluster their nest 

in my hair. 

Producing Spain of blood, wine, and fire.

Nymphs of the forest tell me

your reflection is resurrect.

My heart flutters.

The ebony raven circles her ritual dialect.

You know my language,

my Astros, my heavenly body,

curves and all.

The prelude of my breath

awakens the sacred.

The verse of my rhythm wind

calls for the love spell

of my magic that

is back again.

© 2023 Leticia Alaniz

A Tree Within / Árbol Adentro - A Byzantine Mosaic In Honor of Octavio Paz

A Tree Within / Árbol Adentro
Byzantine Glass Mosaic by Leticia Alaniz © 2018

A pattern of design made from thousands of tiny brilliant cut glass, stone, shells, gold, or ceramic pieces has been the subject of awe and admiration in many cultures.  The physical presence of a mosaic mural has been since time immemorial a system of pictures to tell stories and convey histories.  It has been the art of eternity which explores vibrant, colorful and energetic pasts.  

Among the many design elements is the tree of life.  It’s a concept that symbolizes the beginning of life and the origin of everything.  For thousands of years in almost all cultures, religions, mythologies, and philosophies, the tree has been an icon and a theme that we encounter in daily life.  As a sacred symbol, it has mystified and has been the subject of celebration of deities and is a direct link to the divine and the mythical cosmologies.  

The tree has roots that reach deeply into the depths which take nourishment from Mother Earth and thru its upward reaching branches it absorbs light from the sun.  A tree symbolizes generations of families that grow and create new fruit to begin a new generation.  Trees have a cycle of life that regenerate with the seasons making it a symbol of immortality, rebirth and the duality of life and death.  The grandness of a tree connects all forms of creation, heaven, the underworld, and knowledge that resides in our past, present, and future.

In his poem Árbol Adentro / A Tree Within, Mexican Nobel Laureate Octavio Paz created a metaphysical metaphor of an inverted tree which grows within his body. With its canopy and leaves up in his head, the words depict an illustration of desire inspired by the beauty and presence of a woman.  The poem establishes that “Its roots are veins…”  The branches stretch out into the inner depths of his nerves and the body’s extremities, “Thoughts are its tangled foliage…”  The poet describes an escalating passion that ends with a metaphorical touch “Whose glance sets it on fire…” provoking the love and the other person’s presence to be inflamed with desire.  The themes of the tree suggest a sexual encounter with the pomegranate seeds in reference to a man’s seed, “Day Breaks / In the body’s night…”  Its an acknowledgment of his need for the love of the woman.  In the final lines, the poem entices the other to come closer and, “Hear the tree speak.”

Mexican Poet Octavio Paz

There is no doubt that Octavio Paz left his mark on the world of poetry and is a force to be reckoned with.  Just the same, his poetry has greatly influenced me in the creation of my own art, photography, and writings.  As an homage to his poem Árbol Adentro / A Tree Within, I created this mosaic tree in Mexican and Venetian smalti tesserae glass in the tradition of the ancient Byzantine art.  With branches of pure gold smalti tesserae and cobalt blue representing a life cycle.  Red as a symbol of blood and earth reaching up to the trunk and the branches feeding life to the tree giving it a sense of timelessness and eternal life.  

Filmmaker & Artist Leticia Alaniz
© 2018
Mexican Huipil Crafted & Designed by Poet Natalia Toledo

A Tree Within

A tree grew inside my head.
A tree grew in.
Its roots are veins,
its branches nerves,
thoughts its tangled foliage
Your glance sets it on fire,
and its fruits of shade
are blood oranges
and pomegranates of flame.

Day breaks

in the body's night.
There, within, inside my head,
the tree speaks.

Come closer - can you hear it?

–Octavio Paz
1914-1998

© Leticia Alaniz 2018

All Rights Reserved

"I'm Going To Sleep"

"Voy a Dormir"
Photo by Leticia Alaniz © 2011
Model Juliana Thompson

Voy A Dormir is the title of Alfonsina Storni's last published poem and she meant her poem to be literal and for eternal life.  I'm Going To Sleep was her farewell letter from the mundane world.

Alfonsina Storni was perhaps one of the greatest Latin American poets of the modernist period.  She was born in Switzerland in 1892, to Argentine parents that were in the beer producing industry.  

At a very young age, her family moved back to Argentina and opened a tavern in the city of Rosario.  She worked many different chores in the tavern but became more curious with an acting career, and she joined a traveling theatre company in 1907.  

After touring with the company she returned to the city of Rosario and became a teacher. She taught primary school and developed a passion for writing.  Her first published work was for Mundo Rosarino and Monos Y Monadas local magazines, as well as Mundo Argentino.

She decided to remain in anonymity for much of her writing, which led her to move to Buenos Aires in 1911.  The following year her son Alejandro was born, the illegitimate son of a journalist. 

In 1920 she published her book Languidez which won her the First Municipal Poetry Prize and the second National Literature Prize and soon after published Ocre.  

Her writing style became more and more a reflection of her own life and afflictions, with a strong feminist theme.  She reclused herself even more, living a life of solitude, which affected her health and mental stability and caused her to leave her job as a teacher.

Her writing became a dramatic lyricism, with erotic tones unknown in those days.  Feminist thoughts became a major theme as can be seen in Mundo de Siete Pozos (1934) and Mascarilla y Trebol (1938).

After her friend Quiroga, a writer, committed suicide, Alfonsina Storni sunk into a deep depression.  She was diagnosed with cancer and was left to live with her disease alone.  She wrote very little in those days.  

One day in October of 1938, Storni sent her last poem, Voy a dormir (I'm going to sleep), to La Nacion newspaper.  She left her writing desk and laid down her pen and ink forever.  She walked towards the sea at the quiet beach of La Perla, in Mar del Plata, Argentina.    

Alfonsina Storni (May 29, 1892 – October 25, 1938)

She walked into the sea deeper and deeper until she drowned.  Later that morning workers found her body washed up on the beach.  No one knows why she was such a solitude figure and why she was so depressed, sad and isolated. 

Her death inspired Ariel Ramirez and Felix Luna to compose the song Alfonsina y el Mar (Alfonsina and the sea").   The song has been performed by Mercedes Sosa, Tania Libertad, Nana Mouskouri, Mocedades, Andres Calamaro and many others.

Listen to the song inspired by Alfonsina Storni:
Alfonsina y el mar:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=elFfCLa6wNM

Written by Leticia Alaniz © 2011