Observant

Rocío Cerón | Translated by Dallin Law

The opus is present. In the shadowed drapes. The blushing, buttressing. The pouring. The loquat shadow epiphany. The ant fixedly holding its course, its plodding gait. The whispers amid forms. Time conversing among knots. The silence of clay, its all-encompassing reflection. The fallen branch. The ash tree presiding over a couple conversing. The water’s descent, in sing-song olive green. The old guest room privy to comings and goings. What’s left of a former shape. What’s present.

Crossed metal threads ignite the dirt. Volcanic stone cuirass, a song disgorged into mud. Turbid. Meanwhile news filtered through, news of the bodies. The bodies. The gravity of a cement block as counterweight, a featherweight presence in the face of the crowd. Gravel. Dried footprints treading on thousands of memories. It turned out the numbers had names of their own. Nomenclature of skin and memory. Trunk. Pyramidal edifice housing a celestial vault. Tamped down and forged. Suspended beam. The structure’s stability. They said, then, that her name was rugged and fragile, like death’s.

Shoulders. Stacked shapes. Teeth, hips, forehead. The reflection constitutes an infinite box. Matryoshka. Destruction or restitution. At an animalic trot, lend it your ears, eyes. Weeds. Garden in view, sunflower background where—exchanging glances—heliogenic green, birch green, felt green, verdigris green, linden green, frond green, mold green, chromium oxide green, reseda green, moss green, jungle green, bronze green, bile green, sap green, cadmium green, opal green, loden green, Umbrian green, victoria green, poison green endure.

A private space. An illuminated space. The merest patch of refuge. Sunlight allays even rarefied thoughts. The rock engraved with the rushing breath of prehistoric gales. Aqueducts and fountainheads. Lime whitewashed walls shelter every word. Structures composed of wrought iron and windows, angles permitting an inward look, into the intimacy of stone. A volcanic hand cupping a bent thistle.

Serenity and ceasefire. A brushed-against leaf puts anger to rest. Venation, pilosity, fury cast on the ground. Wind rushes across arms, barely a rumor, hinting at shapes. Earthworms and houseflies weave a millennial accord. The scars on your body could buttress caverns. Immaculate white, aspect of the true water—cadence—that turns the bite, the poison, into air.

Observante

Lo hecho en lo que está. El cortinaje oscurecido. Lo que arrebola y sostiene. Lo que vierte. La sombra epifánica del níspero. La hormiga que mantiene tramo, peso, ritmo. Lo que musita entre formas. El tiempo que habla entre nudos. El silencio del barro, sus reflejos que todo lo comprenden. La rama caída. La tutela del fresno en la conversación marital. El descenso del agua, su sonsonete oliva. La vieja habitación de invitados donde se pronunciaron los dimes y diretes. Lo que hay en la forma que fue. Lo que está.

Cruzados hilos de metal inciden sobre tierra. Volcánica coraza de piedra, canto que desemboca en lodo. Turbiedad. Entretanto las noticias calaban, las noticias de esos cuerpos. Los cuerpos. Contrapeso, gravedad del bloque, liviana presencia ante multitud. Grava. Seco paso de pies sobre miles de recuerdos. Sucedía que las cifras habían obtenido nombres propios. Nomenclatura de piel y memoria. Tronco. Construccíon piramidal para albergar bóveda celeste. Apisonado y fragua. Colgante viga. Establidad del conjunto. Se decía, entonces, que el nombre de ella era robusto y frágil, como la muerte.

Hombros. Formas sobre otras. Dientes, caderas, frente. El reflejo constituye una caja infinita. Matrushka. Destruction or retablecimiento. Al trote del animal, darle oído, ojos. Maleza. Jardín a la mirada, fondo tornasol donde perviven -se miran- verde heliógeno, verde abedul, verde fieltro, verde cardnillo, verde tilo, verde fronda, verda moho, verde cromo, verde reseda, verde musgo, verde jungla, verde bronce, verde hiel, verde savia, verde cadmio, verde ópalo, verde loden, umbro verde, verde victoria, verde veneno.

Espacio privado. Espacio alumbrante. Mínimo rescate de piso. Aquieta la luz solar los pensamientos, los enrarecidos. Había esculpido en la roca el poderoso soplo de vendavales prehistóricos. Acueductos y manantiales. Muros blanqueados de cal que guarecen lo dicho. Estructuras de hierro forjado y ventanas, ángulos desde donde mirarse hacia dentro hacia lo íntimo de la piedra. Volcánica mano que sostiene al cardo herido.

Serenidad y tregua. Al tacto las hojas amansan toda cólera. Nervaduras, pilosidad, furia a tierra. A un costado del brazo, corre viento, apenas rumor que masculla formas. Lombrices y moscas tejen una complicidad milenaria. Por las cicatrices de tu cuerpo sotendría cavernas. Albura, dimensión de la verdadera agua -cadencia- que transforma la mordedura, el veneno, en aire.

Poet and sound artist Rocío Cerón is based in Mexico City. Her experimental work explores the construction of memory and the generative suspension and displacement of meanings, combining language, sound, and performance into transmedia pieces. She’s written many books of poetry, most recently Divisible corpóreo (2022), Simultáneo sucesivo (2022), and Spectio (2019). She has also released sound poetry albums that accompany and further her poetry, including Speculari (2023), MIIUNI (2022), and Sonic Bubbles (2020). Samples of her work have been translated into several languages and Anna Rosenwong’s translation of Diorama won the 2015 Best Translated Book Award. She has performed her work at venues and museums in France, the UK, Mexico, Sweden, and Spain. She has been part of the National System of Art Creators of Mexico (SNCA) since 2010 and professor/founder of the creative writing program of the Universidad del Claustro de Sor Juana since 2008.

Dallin Law is a translator of Spanish, focused on experimental Mexican literature. His translations of Rocío Cerón have also been published in The Canary, Poetry Daily, Denver Quarterly, ANMLY, and Circumference. He is a graduate of the Translator’s Workshop at the University of Iowa.

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