The blue boat - La barca azul

Mexico
Photograph © Brent Kollock

At dawn, the north wind blew the waves strongly, beating its foamy arms with fervor until a boat was wrecked on the beach. Its blue color had faded in parts where the sea had taken its due when navigating its waters. A sign on the side in scarlet letters read Palom r. The letter a had been erased and a grayish shadow remained in its place.

The sun's rays rushed down and the light peeked out between my toes. Because of my exhaustion, I couldn't lift my eyes any longer. So I slept a while. I was hungry and thirsty.  I had to get to town before the downpour fell.  

I tried to rush my sleep. My bare chest, dry with sand, reminded me of the luck of my escape from my husband's house. I ran out into the night when he tried to lock me in a room under a padlock. I managed to shake off his anger by throwing a wooden jewelry box at the window. The cracks in the glass were my door of freedom and I ran in the moonlight until I reached the beach.

I walked towards the blue boat. Its whale-like figure had an empty skeleton belly. I 
found a rope and a fishing net. I climbed in and hid. I tried to stop the wind with my fingers. The boat rocked and the waves spoke sweetly to her.  She moved until she was stuck in a rocky corner where white flowers grew. The flowers gave off a scent of honey-pollen and the bees buzzed quickly, intoxicated by their feeding. The coarse grain of the sand was like white sugar that melts with water. I imagined eating the sand with honey and thus I calmed the anguish of my hunger.

Photograph © Brent Kollock

Thick, heavy drops began to appear. I thought it would be a light drizzle, but then it gained strength and jets of water moved the boat from its place.  Bubbles and foam from the sea crashed in and turned my refuge into a heavy belly. I abandoned the boat.

I came upon a thatched shack at a fisherman's wharf. A toothless lady dressed in a stained apron bellowed at me, "Dirty!" When they smell a strange presence, the skinny, mangy dogs come out to bark, dripping saliva. The uproar summoned people to lean out the door to take a look.  Another lady with broad shoulders and a bent forehead offered me a scratchy cloth to cover my nakedness. Her hands with luminous scales that had stuck dry to her hands smelled of guts and fish. But I felt her motherhood in her eyes and she offered me lodging in her hut.

She comforted me, “Tomorrow will dawn a clear day pronounced by the mouth of God. Come on girl, sleep. The journey is long and we women are of dominion and power. "

Written by Leticia Alaniz

© 2021

Photograph © Brent Kollock

 

 

"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