MARTA NÚÑEZ POUZOLS

CROWNING OF THE WEEPING BRIDE

These antlers

won't stop growing

into the sky

they ramify

mirroring roots

as below

They become

capillaries of night

spurt signature

alveolar pact

so within

This tower

is a library

in flames

is your spine

each vertebra

a different

discipline

crumbling

as without

Your clueless daughter

as innocent

as doves

so above

These cherubs' heads

popping off

a dark river

you to reach

the other shore

so within

Bundle baby

as shrewd

as snakes

decoy baby

contracted

as within

Stabbed canvas

a landscape

behind the landscape

bleeding

into

your hands

so without

so

without

UP THAT HILL

After Clive Barker's "In the Hills, the Cities"

so the cities went up into the hills

how long until we get there

our thousand bodies tied to each other

building a giant out of us

my whole bodies      a part

of a single articulation

knee, elbow – powered by

contact flowing

among many

heads to toes

hands to mouths

hearts to livers

rope abounds threading we

next of

kin    original kin

rope doesn't know

you alive or dead

rope doesn't care

hell a million fires

from an only flame

a million tooth

an only ache

the silence

before the stomp

Stomp.

Stomp.

a prophecy

is the movement

that comes closer

a prophecy is binding

rope like blind

imaginations gone

feral fucking finally

do we untie

or do we belong

THE ARRIVAL OF THE SQUID

4.

The reader's eyes get stuck

chafing squid organs

behind which

features struggle

to form a face

quaking

Serpents of Sight

finally a full face

congeals

Her eyes retract

through hands

The squid reader faints

The evil eye flickers

The speakers feed back

The sea memorialized

Marta Núñez Pouzols is a poet and translator from Andalusia, Spain. She immigrated to the Triangle area of North Carolina in 2008, and currently lives in Durham. She co-authored with Argentine poet Maia Morosano the bilingual collection Pronombres siderales/Starry Selves (Turba, 2019.) Her poems can be found in Telegráfica, Works & Days, and Lute & Drum, among others. Marta co-curates the reading series Paradiso and organizes Moon Palace, a horizontal writers' workshop. She also writes critical pieces and reviews on film and sound. IG: @martanunezpouzols
www.martanunezpouzols.com