Author Archives: jeffersonbeavers

Marisol Baca The Last Home of Manuelita   she poured ox blood to set it make the dirt still hot iron and board along a wall ironing other people’s sheets to make money to enter step down a darkened room the single step is wooden and so worn it is a smooth dip the sizeContinue reading “Marisol Baca – The Last Home of Manuelita”

Marisol Baca After Boarding School, Manuelita Yearns for her Mandolin   When she came home she didn’t recognize many things her own face was a song she was taught to sing summer was canning peaches in a white woman’s home she could can anything after those summers pick clean cull stop bubble fill squeeze PlayingContinue reading “Marisol Baca – After Boarding School, Manuelita Yearns for her Mandolin”

Marisol Baca I only knew her from her braids   Grandma Manuelita I only knew her from her braids the ritual of them   Marisol Baca’s artist statement: Over the past 15 days, I have been writing a poem a day. This concentrated workload allowed me to sit face-to-face with poems that I have beenContinue reading “Marisol Baca – I only knew her from her braids”

Marisol Baca Swell   New Mexico 2019 the night before I carried my father’s ashes to the mountains of his home I walked to the edge of the roiling dark of the Rio Grande river thick water of memory and suffering Guadalupe? I asked be with me and my sisters tonight I dipped a bowlContinue reading “Marisol Baca – Swell”

Marisol Baca Ode to a Rusty Square Nail   The people living here before left many things objects that have become junk large collections of rusted sinks, skeletons of farm equipment, car engine parts until they became hills hidden in a thin layer of dirt and Bermuda grass so many hills that the land wasContinue reading “Marisol Baca – Ode to a Rusty Square Nail”