Carlota wears her sister’s life like skin,
a snug imprisonment. She wanted less
surety, wanted not to be
moonservant to a planet on its boisterous
orbit. But Maria Conceição’s
children were easy, their faces
bowls to be filled. And so
once the dispensation had been granted
she married him, her sister’s widower,
brother by affinity but not
by consanguinity. He was, at least,
good-looking. She was young, she did her job,
she made the soup. When the babies came
she fed them. He was always off
driving his mules or singing in those silly
contests. She was the one they circled
holding up fingers to be bandaged,
confiding fears and dreams. She scrubbed the purple
stains of fear, but dreams make a soft shimmy,
blank as milk. So she curdled milk,
ladled it into molds and drained the whey
and waited. In the morning
they had fresh cheese with their breakfast bread.
These are your dreams, she said.
If you eat your dreams, you will live
your dreams. What did they know? They thought
she was the earth because she was the mother.
That was when she knew her sister’s life
had flaked and peeled away. Her arms were tanned
and strong, and she was hungry. She sprinkled
sea salt on the surface of her piece
of cheese and she ate it with a knife.
Ed. Note: This is from the Lusosphere feature at The Common. What does Lusosphere signify? The term encompasses the diverse people, 270 million of them, who share one thing: Portuguese as a principal language. Nancy Couto is one three Luso-American poets in the feature.