Image by Anton Darius/Unsplash, Public Domain Dedication (CC0).
Epitaph
Of all the freedoms
you, perhaps,
chose death.
And the watercolors of our childhood
are fading
vanishing into thin air …
Through the salt marsh I will search for you
when the sun allows me to look back.
I will arrive at your grave to leave you
a branch broken off an almond tree,
and a poem killed by anguish, which you
have already illustrated with your blood.
Copyright 1992 by Alicia Partnoy. Reprinted from Revenge of the Apple – Venganza de la manzana, published by Cleis Press, with permission from Alicia Partnoy. Translated by Richard Schaaf, Regina Kreger, and Alicia Partnoy.
This poem was originally read in the On Being episode “Laying the Dead to Rest.”
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