Susana Praver-Pérez

DANCING BOMBA EN LA GOYCO 

I strain to hear el maestro’s words,

inflections careening

off concrete walls,

a flash aguacero rumbling.

He weaves yoruba y español,

centuries of Puerto Rican history

wedged like shims

in the slim caesura between words.

maraca, barril, y cuá

sicá, cuembe, yubá

He shares a dancer’s terms—

pasos, piquetes, el repique,

an arc of energy

as large as one’s wingspan

even with fists

planted on hips,

aún así.

I listen with poet’s ears, learn

to mark one’s space

with the tips of los dedos corazón—

the heart fingers, so named

by the Greeks who believed

a vein ran from the longest digit

to the center of one’s heart.

I stretch my arms wide,

fingers reaching

beyond the walls.

I inhabit my body, feet

in the beat of sicá,

while my mind travels

through time.

I remember children’s voices

bounding off these walls

back when this centro cultural

was a school

y mi suegra lived

on the second floor

of the building next door.

We told time by the glee of recess banter

in the playground below her balcón.

Floating in amber,

the past dances

before me, invisible

a los demás.

Bittersweet reveries 

drip down my arms,

pool at my feet— 

one, two, three y ¡Tá!

Golpe caja on the drum—

Tún, ta-ca-ta, Tún, taca-ta, ¡Tá!

Language of the drum,

lingo of the body,

idiom of mi dedo corazón

pointing

towards the treetops,

reaching

for recuerdos

nesting

in the leaves

of my heart.

MOURNING IN “LA CASA DE LA PLENA”    

(For Héctor René "Tito" Matos Otero, June 15, 1968 – January 18, 2022)

Me pueden quitar mi casa

me pueden quitar mi tienda

dejarme sin una prenda

sin mi carro, sin mi plaza

pero hay algo que mi raza

protege con gran tesón

del tirano y del ladrón 

y es mi plena borinqueña

de la cual nadie se adueña 

pues vive en el corazón 

— Javier Curet

(From “No Me Quiten Mi Plena”) 

Plenero, no te quitamos nada—

al contrario, corazones infinitos 

te cantamos alabanzas, al ritmo del tambor

you, el ritmo del pueblo

you, who lives in our hearts

Los panderos son mariposas—

thrum of the drums filling La Goyco

sound of a thousand monarch wings 

you, el rey de los cueros

you, monarch in flight

Los panderos son estrellas—

your body beneath a galaxy’s swirl

buoyed by a sea, dappled mirror of stars

you, una estrella brillante

you, light of a shooting star

Los panderos son una hostia—

every plenero un cura

singing plenas de luto

for you, cantamos tributo 

for you, we sing a praise song 

OCEAN BREACH: A TALE OF TWO  HOUSES 

To the left, a crumble of history:

Moorish arches, mosaic tile,

soaring ceilings, louvered wood

windows, an overhung roof.

Rooms cooled by thick brick and Atlantic breeze,

once filled with patois of país,

sancocho and casabe served on caoba tables

topped with handmade lace.

The house’s age is etched on its face

in a multitude of salt-air pocks, 

title traversing

generations.

To the right, transplanted northern style—

expanse of thick plate-glass, marble & steel,

hermetically sealed against sound and sea,

a beach-front fortress a half-block wide.

Nighttime dreams are lodged between 

parentheses of security cameras and fences 

fashioned to stop excess from flowing 

towards need.

The sea is the color of dollars

 and a million is minimum for a front row seat.

A chorus of get-out-of-the-way-to-make-room-for-me

fills the gated streets.

Moonlight floods the old house’s roof.

Palm fronds pave the path to the beach.

Investors eye the edge of the sea where fishermen once hauled

crabs that spread across the sand like a giant sea-god’s wings.

This collapsing scaffold of the past

stands as testament for those who know

how to see through

twisted histories.

In others’ minds, it is an eye-sore

to be razed, a barrier reef  

stopping the flow of cash crashing

like a 50-foot wave onto the beach.

An enchantress named tax-haven woos

neo-colonizers to this pastiche of paradise

where they feign royalty 

from abodes on Kings Court.

Fleeing the rat race, they race like rats to the top of the heap,

displace those who sleep in homes passed down by abuelos,

push them out— to Caguas or Canóvanas,

then curate sea views for a fee.

                         How do we heal the breach when a floodtide of wealth

greases local wheels with a whiff of the kill?

How do we halt this gluttony for luxury, ocean, and bone,

     stop vultures gutting palomas perched in uva de playa trees?