Poems

MARIANA SPADA
Two Poems
translation by Robin Myers

Theodicy

My father’s hands
gave form to some
of this family’s 
most memorable projects.
The loft, for instance:
for two whole weeks
after coming home from the meat-packing plant
he battered walls
gashing enormous holes
like newborn eyes 
that pierced the walls
and seemed to watch us
all day long
amid the grime.

From the living room to the dining room
from the dining room to the bedroom
he’d hang crosspieces of thick locust wood;
above, a sky of varnished tongue and 
above, a sky of varnished tongue and+groove.
And all at once, the house had twice
as many rooms, and we were scattered
evenly, sister with sister and brother 
with brother, about
the new spaces.

Another time
he planted an orange tree in the yard
which thrived and yielded copious
fruit, until one morning
fifteen years later, without explanation,
he yanked it from the ground.

These are just
examples. Only God can take away
what God has given.

Teodicea

Mi padre
dio forma con sus propias manos
a algunos de los proyectos
más memorables de esta familia
por ejemplo el entrepiso nuevo:
durante dos semanas enteras
después del volver del frigorífico
todo fue picar paredes
abrir agujeros enormes
como ojos recién nacidos
que atravesaban los muros
y parecĂ­an vigilarnos
durante el dĂ­a entero
a través del polvillo.

De la sala al comedor
del comedor al dormitorio
cruzĂł tirantes de grueso algarrobo
y sobre ellos un cielo de machimbre 
y sobre ellos un cielo de machimbre+barnizado.
De repente hubo el doble de cuartos
en la casa, y hermana con
hermana y hermano con hermano
fuimos parejamente repartidos
entre las nuevas estancias.

En otra ocasiĂłn
plantĂł un naranjo en la vereda
que prosperĂł y dio abundancia de
frutos, hasta que una mañana
quince años después y sin mediar razón,
lo arrancĂł de raĂ­z.

Estos son solamente
ejemplos. SĂłlo Dios quita
lo que Dios ha dado.


Ferreri Livestock

I try yet again to explain
what my father did for a living.
Let’s say
there was a problem in the plant
a tube sputtering ammonia
a bolt gun
depressurized
it doesn’t really matter what.
So many things can go awry
and that’s inevitable
in any submarine
or slaughterhouse.
So then someone would take
the path along the stream
flawed piece in hand
and walk out to the depot
where my father was.
Years on the job had taught him
to know if a replacement part
was there among the scores of boxes
and find it with a glance.
If not, he’d file
the order form.
If so, there wasn’t much
of an enigma to it:
my father would bring in the substitute
compare
the new part to
the old
and if they matched
he’d sign the sheet
and then be left alone again
the lord and master of his afternoons
he never used to write short stories
or join a union:
that was it, pretty much.

Ferreri Ganadera

Vuelvo a intentar explicar
en qué consistía el trabajo de mi padre.
Vamos a suponer
que algo fallaba en la planta
una tuberĂ­a escupĂ­a amonĂ­aco
o una pistola de perno
se quedaba sin presiĂłn
no importa qué exactamente
infinitas cosas pueden salir mal
y esto es inevitable
ya sea en un submarino
o en un matadero.
Alguien tomaba entonces
el camino del arroyo
con la pieza vencida
y caminaba hasta el depĂłsito
donde esperaba mi padre.
Los años le habían enseñado
a evaluar de una ojeada
la existencia o no del reemplazo
entre los cientos de cajones:
si no habĂ­a repuesto
armaba la nota de pedido
si la pieza estaba
no habĂ­a mucho misterio:
mi padre la traĂ­a
la apoyaba en el escritorio
las comparaban
la pieza nueva
la pieza vieja
si coincidĂ­an
se firmaba el recibo
y volvĂ­a a quedarse solo
dueño absoluto de sus tardes
que nunca usĂł para escribir relatos
ni organizarse sindicalmente:
eso era más o menos todo.

Mariana Spada was born in Entre RĂ­os, Argentina, in 1979. She studied literature at the Universidad Nacional del Litoral. Between 2006 and 2018, she lived in various parts of Buenos Aires. She currently lives and works in Barcelona, Catalonia. In 2019, she published her first book, Ley de conservaciĂłn (Gog y Magog). Other work from this collection has appeared in English in Words Without Borders.

Robin Myers is a Mexico City-based poet and translator. She was among the winners of the 2019 Poem in Translation Contest held by Words Without Borders and the Academy of American Poets. Recent or forthcoming translations include Another Life by Daniel Lipara, The Restless Dead by Cristina Rivera Garza, Cars on Fire by MĂłnica RamĂłn RĂ­os, Animals at the End of the World by Gloria Susana Esquivel, and Lyric Poetry Is Dead by Ezequiel Zaidenwerg.