YOU HAD GLITTER ON YOUR FINGERS

I can hug the old refrigerator before they take it away.
I can write that you had glitter on your fingers and that burning glitter smells like a fairy tale.
I can bite the cat’s tail.
I can bite my husband’s beard, because it is mine, because it is mine and tastes like fruit.
I can cry and say that I’m crying, and not feel embarrassed by my pink cheeks.
I can be sappy.
I can dance naked with the windows open.
I can paint each nail a different color.
I can clean the house only once a week.
I can refuse to read the news.
I can refuse to hear the planes.
I can refuse to feed the mosquitoes with my thick, viscous blood.
I can invent a lullaby for deaf children, the only thing missing is a voice, the only thing missing is a long neck where we can resound.
I can say that we are scared.
I can say that hunger is an invention of our teeth so they don’t feel so alone.
I can write the word cancer a thousand times, because cancer reproduces a thousand times. It is a relentless killer, and I am also a relentless killer, and I swear I will get my revenge.
I can dream I’m kissing a made-up poet.
I can dream I’m a drop of acid rain.
I can use up all my Candy Crush lives until I finally feel that I have died. That I have died in the magical world of the candies.
I can leave the gas on.
I can light all the candles.
I can invite domestic catastrophes, cut off my finger, or cut off my nipple, or cut off a single hair and afterward eat up all my remains.
I can wish for a baby.
I can want a baby.
I can love the stupid and sweet idea of longing for a baby with all my guts.
I can make love with myself.
I can knock myself up with self-love.
I can say me, me, me, me, me and me, and still be here alone.
I can breathe underwater.
I can entertain myself with any fly.
I can collect photographs of my mother and stick her pale face on the wings of a dove.
I can fly.
I can fly.
I can set fire to everything when it pleases me.
The air here smells like fairy dust.
There is no more glitter.
There are no more sparkles.
I hug the old fridge.
There is no more body.

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Image: Luna Miguel

Luna Miguel I’m 23 and live in Barcelona. I’ve published books of poetry and fiction. I write for PlayGround. I edit for El Gaviero Ediciones. I’m on Twitter and Instagram at @lunamonelle.

Julia Ostmann translates from Spanish. Currently she studies creative writing, Spanish, and the history of science at Harvard University, where she writes for several student newspapers and magazines. In Buenos Aires, she has taken classes at the University of Buenos Aires, Torcuato di Tella University, and the National University Institute of Art. Some of her literary role models include Zadie Smith, Gabriela Mistral, Joan Didion, Alfonsina Storni, Karen Russell, and Thornton Wilder. She is a native Southern Californian.