INTRO:
How does it feel to leave a world that was built over a lifetime? Whether one is a refugee fleeing from war or a yuppie chasing First World opportunities, migration is not just a change in geography. It’s an upheaval that re-maps the terrain of one’s world. As with all cataclysms, one is left to pick up the pieces and cobble them together into a new, handmade life." - Clarissa
By Clarissa Trinidad Gonzalez
Let me build new lives around these fragments
make baroque pearls from shards of war
and rough diamonds from ash of poverty
Let me knit shawls from vivid yarns
and sew heirloom quilts from forest shreds
ribbons of waterfalls
all our tattered finery
Send me an ember of the tropical sun
to start a fire in my new home’s hearth
I will kindle with autumn leaves
and melt my golden comb, broken-toothed
to mint the new coin of the realm.
(Published originally in Variety Crossing: Transcription, 2006)
About the Poet:
Clarissa Trinidad Gonzalez is a Filipina author, poet, essayist, and one-time contributing writer to Woman Today and City Man magazines in the Philippines. She has just finished her debut novel, Celestina’s House, due to be released in September 2024.
Clarissa lives in Toronto.
If you liked what you just read and want more of Our Brew, subscribe to get notified. Just enter your email below.
Related Posts
What the Child Cannot Learn From Books
Oct 24, 2024
Crafting Poems that Speak to Both You and Your Audience
Oct 01, 2024
Lush Life
Aug 20, 2024