Moon from the Porch
By Annie Finch

Bilingual/Bilingüe
~ Rhina P. Espaillat

My father liked them separate, one there,
one here (allá y aquí), as if aware

that words might cut in two his daughter’s heart
(el corazón) and lock the alien part

to what he was—his memory, his name
(su nombre)—with a key he could not claim.

“English outside this door, Spanish inside,”
he said, “y basta.” But who can divide

the world, the word (mundo y palabra) from
any child? I knew how to be dumb

and stubborn (testaruda); late, in bed,
I hoarded secret syllables I read

until my tongue (mi lengua) learned to run
where his stumbled. And still the heart was one.

I like to think he knew that, even when,
proud (orgulloso) of his daughter’s pen,

he stood outside mis versos, half in fear
of words he loved but wanted not to hear.

A Lady
~ Amy Lowell

You are beautiful and faded,
Like an old opera tune
Played upon a harpsichord;
Or like the sun-flooded silks
Of an eighteenth-century boudoir. In your eyes
Smoulder the fallen roses of outlived minutes,
And the perfume of your soul
Is vague and suffusing,
With the pungence of sealed spice-jars.
Your half-tones delight me,
And I grow mad with gazing
At your blent colors.

My vigor is a new-minted penny,
Which I cast at your feet.
Gather it up from the dust
That its sparkle may amuse you.

Ask me where I’m from, & depending on the day
/ immigrant I feel like being, I may point at the sky

as if it were the embodiment of all places. Ask me
what I’ve given up, & depending on the hour

/ emigrant I feel like honoring, I may point at the dirt
as if it were the embodiment of all things. Ask me

what it’s like to now be an American, & I’ll explain
why motionless people will never understand a subject

without a verb. Come, sit—stand, if you like. Ask
the arrow what it misses of the bow, & it’ll say yes.

Ask the throat what it misses of a word, & it’ll cry
out: I don’t know if I’ll ever find another like it. Ask

the navy noren curtains hanging in each of my doorways
why they choose to part the rooms of my house, &

they may say: because that’s what we’re made for. Ask me
where I’m going, & depending on the minute, I may point

simply forward, may move to the front of the flock.