19-91

Jorge Luis Borges No habrá una sola cosa que no sea

una nube. Lo son las catedrales

de vasta piedra y bíblicos cristales

que el tiempo allanará. Lo es la Odisea.

que cambia como el mar. Algo hay destino

cada vez que la abrimos. El reflejo

de tu cara ya es otro en el espejo

y el día es un dudoso laberinto.

Somos los que se van. La numerosa

nube que se deshace en el poniente

es nuestra imagem. Incesantemente

la rosa se convierte en otra rosa.

Eres nube. Eres mar, eres olvido.

Tato Laviera papá dios está agallao, ya no puede soportar

los “puerto ricans” están orando overtime

no dejamos dormir a dios, está volviéndose loco

con las comiquerías de nosotros, siempre chavándole

la vida, papá dios está prendío, los “puerto ricans”

están “overloading the circuits with numerous requests”

te lo juro, créemelo, yo te lo advertí, lo escribí,

papá dios está enfogonao, deme esto, consígame

aquello, dele luz a mi vida, la com puta dora

tiene corto circuito, las operadoras “complaining”

a la supervisora, “qué diablo’ hablan esas viejas,

rezan el rosario, murmurando como hormigas, their

spanish is unintelligible, they pray too fast”

dios-te-salve-maría-llena-eres-de-padre-nuestro-

gloria-al-padre-y-a-las-galletitas-y-el-chocolate-

caliente-amén, we don’t understand.

the angels brought a lawsuit to the supreme

court of heaven, protesting puerto rican prayers

“we cannot pick up their signals, them puerto rican

ladies, they pray non-stop, when they pray, they

pray for everybody, their prayers are over-

flowing their allotted time, and it’s working

against you, papá dios, we cannot answer their

prayers, they must be wondering, ‘how come papá

dios does not reply?’ they are taking over

the english channels, we cannot identify the items,

judge strictly for yourself, look at this daily sample,

just those pentecostals alone are driving the holy

spirit insane, all they want is transformations,

transformations, we’re not coming down on them

puerto rican bodies, those crazy people are praying

themselves into our jobs, all they want are crazy

indian angels to come down, to assist some crazy

spiritualist, and we don’t understand those native

dialects, papá dios, please change the laws.”

[p. 73] papá dios got up and said … “Bendito, they work so

hard, bendito, they are so passive, i never get

angry with my worthy faithful subjects, it is

just that some crazy puerto rican poet is misinforming

the people, i’m not enfogonao,” papá dios ordered

a new computerized system to solve the inundation

problem, but papá dios said to please tell them

puerto ricans that he’ll listen to their every

desire, if they will give papá dios un brakecito,

concho, “y déjenme dormir. De vez en cuando