That’s a Nation
by Katrina Haddad
translated by Ian Ross Singleton
The sky’s black petals
stuck to the black cropland,
were baked with cherries
in the still hot pie of my palm.
This black hole swallows the light
of our lives
and scatters around itself
bloody rings on the water of memory.
Hatred’s against life,
love’s against death.
Attach this flower to the mitral valve,
sprinkle black seeds on the red cropland,
sing out the U sound:
on high, it even stretches toward the sky on the crossbeam
(really the I alone goes in a straight line)
hidden in the back rows—
in the depths of a cave,
from which the Word is born and of that word,
uttered—under the protection of hands orant,
under the Protection of Our Most Holy Lady,
in Her embrace,
which protects the Word (with the letters J and C)
and the word that starts with U—that’s a nation.
That means a nation.