FreeVerse ~ Carmen Tafolla

Hosted by Cara at Ooh...Books!
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Carmen Tafolla was the guest speaker at a ceremony I recently attended and I was amazed by the depth and passion of her performance. Her poems and stories are so heartfelt it's almost impossible not to be moved by them. The poem I've shared here is from her Sonnets and Salsa collection. My apologies for once again not getting the indentions correct thus detracting somewhat from the visual beauty of her work.

Marked

Never write with pencil,
m'ija.
It is for those
who would
erase.
Make your mark proud
and open,
Brave,
beauty folded into
its imperfection,
Like a piece of turquoise
marked.

Never write
with pencil,
m'ija.
Write with ink
or mud,
or berries grown in
gardens never owned,
or, sometimes,
if necessary,
blood.