Connie Mae Concepción Oliver is a Venezuelan poet and artist living in the Bay Area. Her work has appeared in Denver Quarterly, The Brooklyn Rail and A Velvet Giant, among other places. Her most recent collection of poems, "dormilona" is forthcoming in the Spring of 2025 from Burrow Press.
"Duérmase mi niña"
Venetian blinds
pattern themselves on the wall
same as ever
canals of blue light.
Is it the moon like Gladys
saying Aqui estoy
saying Tampoco te esperes!
How did our 19th-century relatives
view the blue screens of their nearish tech?
Sliding a hand across
the daguerreotype, kind of knowing; Por ahí vienen
cosas tremendas. Peering into the future they felt
the arrogant light coming through
the coiled wire.
The blinds stamped on the wall
bring me closer to the linguistic abyss
we are from. The cruciferous brain intuits nothing in the forest.
Delta Delta Delta
We land in MIA and remember English
the letters fall on their sides and become threads
undulating then frozen on the wall.
I look up and see the acne-scarred moon
adolescent, not understanding,
paddling into the riptide.
